Systems and methods for offline usage of saas applications

ABSTRACT

Data from a SaaS application may be stored and accessed locally, enabling SaaS data to be interacted with, regardless of connectivity, while providing secure authentication when offline. When online, a user may perform an authentication procedure and provide credentials to an application server, which may provide an authentication token for access to secure data or applications. The authentication token and user credentials may be cached locally. When offline or experiencing intermittent connectivity, if user provided credentials match the cached credentials, then the client application may retrieve the cached authentication token and allow the embedded browser to resume utilizing the network application and/or data; while if the new credentials do not match the previously provided and cached credentials, access may be denied. Thus, the embedded browser may perform authentication agnostic to whether the device is online or offline at that time, requiring no changes to the browser or network application.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a divisional of and claims priority to and thebenefit of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/148,375, titled “SYSTEMSAND METHODS FOR OFFLINE USAGE OF SAAS APPLICATIONS,” and filed on Oct.1, 2018, the contents of all of which are hereby incorporated herein byreference in its entirety for all purposes.

FIELD OF THE DISCLOSURE

The present application generally relates to management of applications,including but not limited to systems and methods for using an embeddedbrowser to manage and monitor web and software-as-a-service (SaaS)applications.

BACKGROUND

As the workforce of an enterprise becomes more mobile and work undervarious conditions, an individual can use one or more client devices,including personal devices, to access network resources such as webapplications. Due to differences between the client devices and themanner in which network resources can be accessed, there are significantchallenges to the enterprise in managing access to network resources andmonitoring for potential misuse of resources.

In many implementations of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications,client devices must be continuously connected to application servers toallow users to interact with the SaaS application, preventing the userfrom being able to work offline, such as when travelling or with poor orintermittent connectivity. Even in implementations in which some or allof the network application may be cached locally to provide offline use,users may be limited to specific portions of the application orfunctions, or may be limited in the data they may access. Furthermore,caching of data for offline use may represent a significant securityvulnerability. While the user may initially provide authenticationcredentials and achieve authenticated access to the network applicationor data, once offline, the user typically has unimpeded access to thecached data. A malicious actor that obtains access to the client device,either locally or via a network, may be able to access the cached data.

BRIEF SUMMARY

The present disclosure provides methods for storing, accessing, andsynchronizing data from a SaaS application, enabling SaaS data to beinteracted with, regardless of connectivity, while providing secureauthentication when offline. During a first time period when online, auser may perform an authentication procedure and provide credentials toan application server, which may provide an authentication token foraccess to secure data or applications. In some implementations, theauthentication token may comprise a shared encryption key or othercryptographic key for decrypting provided data. The authentication tokenand user credentials may be cached locally. During a second time periodwhen offline or when experiencing intermittent connectivity, a clientapplication on the client device comprising an embedded browser foraccessing the network application may act as a local authenticationserver: the user may provide authentication credentials to the networkapplication. If the credentials match the previously provided and cachedcredentials, then the client application may retrieve the cachedauthentication token and allow the embedded browser to resume utilizingthe network application and/or data; while if the new credentials do notmatch the previously provided and cached credentials, access may bedenied. To prevent brute-force attacks, the locally cached credentialsand/or token may be expired or deleted after a predetermined timeperiod.

The embedded browser and cached version of the network application maycontinue to operate normally in such implementations. For example, theembedded browser may display a typical log-in window in which the usermay provide credentials, and may attempt to transmit the credentials toan authentication server or application server. While online, the clientapplication may allow the transmission to proceed and/or may forward thetransmission to the application server or authentication server. Whileoffline, the client application may intercept the transmission andperform the comparison to locally cached credentials. Thus, the embeddedbrowser may perform authentication agnostic to whether the device isonline or offline at that time, requiring no changes to the browser ornetwork application.

In one aspect, this disclosure is directed to a method for providingauthenticated access to an offline application. The method includestransmitting authentication credentials of a user to a networkapplication executed by one or more application servers, by an embeddedbrowser of a client application executed by a client device. The methodalso includes receiving, by the client application from the one or moreapplication servers, an authentication token responsive to authorizationof the client device by the network application based on theauthentication credentials. The method also includes storing theauthentication credentials in a memory of the client device, by theclient application. The method also includes storing the authenticationtoken in the memory of the client device, by the client application. Themethod also includes accessing data of the network application providedby the one or more application servers, by the embedded browser, usingthe authentication token. The method also includes storing the accesseddata of the network application in the memory of the client device, bythe client application. The method also includes, during a subsequenttime period during which the client device is not in communication withthe one or more application servers: intercepting a transmission by theembedded browser of second authentication credentials, by the clientapplication, responsive to a determination that the client device is notin communication with the one or more application servers; determining,by the client application, that the second authentication credentialscorrespond to the authentication credentials stored in the memory of theclient device; and retrieving, from the memory of the client device, bythe client application, the authentication token, responsive to thedetermination that the second authentication credentials correspond tothe authentication credentials stored in the memory of the clientdevice. The method also includes accessing the data of the networkapplication stored in the memory of the client device, by the embeddedbrowser, using the authentication token.

In some implementations, the method includes determining, by the clientapplication, that a token validity time of the authentication tokenstored in the memory of the client device has not expired; andretrieving the authentication token, by the client application,responsive to the determination that the token validity time has notexpired. In a further implementation, the method includes receiving atoken validity time for the authentication token, from the one or moreapplication servers; and initiating a timer corresponding to the tokenvalidity time, by the client application. In another furtherimplementation, the method includes determining, by the clientapplication, that the token validity time of the authentication tokenstored in the memory of the client device has expired; and removing theauthentication token from the memory of the client device, by the clientapplication, responsive to the determination that the token validitytime has expired.

In some implementations, the method includes decrypting the data, usingthe authentication token, by the client application. In someimplementations, the method includes accessing data of the networkapplication associated with the user, by the embedded browser. In afurther implementation, the embedded browser decrypts the dataassociated with the user via the authentication token.

In another aspect, the present disclosure is directed to a method forsynchronizing an offline and online version of a Software as a Serviceapplication. The method includes providing data of a network applicationin a first state, by one or more application servers to an embeddedbrowser of a client application executed by a client computing device.The method also includes receiving a subsequent recorded sequence ofuser interactions with a cached version of the network applicationprovided via the embedded browser and stored in a memory of the clientcomputing device, by the one or more application servers from the clientcomputing device, upon reestablishment of a communication session withthe client computing device after loss of communications with the clientcomputing device, the sequence of user interactions recorded by theclient application during the period of lost communications, thesequence of user interactions modifying data of the cached version ofthe network application from the first state to a second state. Themethod also includes executing the recorded sequence of userinteractions, by the one or more application servers transparently tothe client computing device, to modify data of the network applicationstored in a storage device of the one or more servers from the firststate to the second state; and providing updated data of the networkapplication in the second state to the embedded browser of the clientapplication, by the one or more application servers.

In some implementations, the method includes providing a first item ofdata of the network application requested by the embedded browser, andproviding a second item of data of the network application, notrequested by the embedded browser, to the client application for storagein the memory of the client computing device. In a furtherimplementation, the second item of data is provided responsive toreceipt of a request from the client application, by the one or moreapplication servers, for the second item of data, the client applicationselecting the second item of data without user intervention. In anotherfurther implementation, the first item of data comprises a first page ofa web application and the second item of data comprises a second page ofthe web application linked from the first page. In still another furtherimplementation, the method includes receiving an authenticationcredential of a user, from the embedded browser, by one or moreapplication servers; and the second item of data is selected from asubset of data of the network application associated with theauthentication credential of the user. In some implementations, themethod includes executing the recorded sequence, by the one or moreapplication servers, faster than real time and without providing visualoutput to the embedded browser of the client application.

In another aspect, the present disclosure is directed to a method forproviding synchronized offline and online access to a web application.The method includes receiving data of a network application in a firststate, by an embedded browser of a client application executed by aclient computing device from one or more application servers. The methodalso includes storing, by the client application in a memory of theclient computing device, the received data of the network applicationthe first state. The method also includes subsequently determining, bythe client application, that the client computing device is not incommunication with the one or more application servers. The method alsoincludes, responsive to the determination that the client computingdevice is not in communication with the one or more application servers,for each of at least one user interaction with the network applicationprovided via the embedded browser modifying the data of the networkapplication from the first state to a second state: intercepting, by theclient application, the user interaction with the network applicationprovided via the embedded browser; redirecting the user interaction tothe stored data of the network application in the memory of the clientcomputing device; and aggregating the user interaction into a recordedsequence of user interactions, by the client application. The methodalso includes subsequently determining, by the client application, thatcommunications have been reestablished with the one or more applicationservers; and responsive to the determination that communications havebeen reestablished with the one or more application servers, providingthe recorded sequence of user interactions to the one or moreapplication servers, by the client application, receipt of the recordedsequence of user interactions causing the one or more applicationservers to execute the recorded sequence of user interactions to modifydata of the network application stored in a storage device of the one ormore servers from the first state to the second state.

In some implementations, the method includes requesting a first item ofdata of the network application, by the embedded browser from the one ormore application servers; and receiving a second item of data of thenetwork application not requested by the embedded browser, by the clientapplication from the one or more application servers.

In a further implementation, the method includes requesting the seconditem of data, by the client application without user intervention,responsive to requesting the first item of data by the embedded browser.In a still further implementation, the method includes selecting thesecond item of data from a set of data previously requested by theembedded browser, by the client application. In another still furtherimplementation, the first item of data comprises a first page of a webapplication, the second item of data comprises a second page linked fromthe first page of the web application, and the method further includes:iteratively storing a number of additional pages of the web application,linked from a previously stored page of the web application, the numberof iterations determined by the client application from a history ofrequests for data of the network application by the embedded browser. Inanother further implementation, the method includes identifying, by theclient application from a history of requests for data of the networkapplication by the embedded browser, an amount of data likely to beaccessed while offline; and requesting the second item of dataresponsive to determining that an amount of data of the networkapplication stored in the memory of the client computing device is lessthan the identified amount of data likely to be accessed while offline.

In some implementations, the method includes providing an authenticationcredential of a user, by the embedded browser, to the one or moreapplication servers; receiving an authentication token, by the embeddedbrowser from the one or more application servers, responsive tosuccessful authentication, the authentication token used to access thedata of the network application; and storing the authentication token,by the client application; and redirecting each user interaction of theat least one user interaction to the stored data of the networkapplication in the memory of the client computing device furthercomprises using the authentication token stored by the clientapplication to access the stored data of the network application.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

The foregoing and other objects, aspects, features, and advantages ofthe present solution will become more apparent and better understood byreferring to the following description taken in conjunction with theaccompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of embodiments of a computing device;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an illustrative embodiment of cloudservices for use in accessing resources;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an example embodiment of an enterprisemobility management system;

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a system 400 of an embedded browser;

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an example embodiment of a system for usinga secure browser;

FIG. 6 is an example representation of an implementation for browserredirection using a secure browser plug-in;

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of example embodiment of a system of using asecure browser;

FIG. 8 is a block diagram of an example embodiment of a system for usinglocal embedded browser(s) and hosted secured browser(s);

FIG. 9 is an example process flow for using local embedded browser(s)and hosted secured browser(s);

FIG. 10 is an example embodiment of a system for managing user access towebpages;

FIG. 11 is a block diagram of an example embodiment of interactionsbetween a client application and a network application;

FIG. 12 is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a method forproviding authenticated access to an offline application; and

FIG. 13 is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a method forsynchronizing an offline and online version of data.

The features and advantages of the present solution will become moreapparent from the detailed description set forth below when taken inconjunction with the drawings, in which like reference charactersidentify corresponding elements throughout. In the drawings, likereference numbers generally indicate identical, functionally similar,and/or structurally similar elements.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

For purposes of reading the description of the various embodimentsbelow, the following descriptions of the sections of the specificationand their respective contents may be helpful:

Section A describes a computing environment which may be useful forpracticing embodiments described herein.

Section B describes systems and methods for an embedded browser.

Section C describes systems and methods for offline usage andsynchronization of network applications.

A. Computing Environment

Prior to discussing the specifics of embodiments of the systems andmethods detailed herein in Section B, it may be helpful to discuss thecomputing environments in which such embodiments may be deployed.

As shown in FIG. 1, computer 101 may include one or more processors 103,volatile memory 122 (e.g., random access memory (RAM)), non-volatilememory 128 (e.g., one or more hard disk drives (HDDs) or other magneticor optical storage media, one or more solid state drives (SSDs) such asa flash drive or other solid state storage media, one or more hybridmagnetic and solid state drives, and/or one or more virtual storagevolumes, such as a cloud storage, or a combination of such physicalstorage volumes and virtual storage volumes or arrays thereof), userinterface (UI) 123, one or more communications interfaces 118, andcommunication bus 150. User interface 123 may include graphical userinterface (GUI) 124 (e.g., a touchscreen, a display, etc.) and one ormore input/output (I/O) devices 126 (e.g., a mouse, a keyboard, amicrophone, one or more speakers, one or more cameras, one or morebiometric scanners, one or more environmental sensors, one or moreaccelerometers, etc.). Non-volatile memory 128 stores operating system115, one or more applications 116, and data 117 such that, for example,computer instructions of operating system 115 and/or applications 116are executed by processor(s) 103 out of volatile memory 122. In someembodiments, volatile memory 122 may include one or more types of RAMand/or a cache memory that may offer a faster response time than a mainmemory. Data may be entered using an input device of GUI 124 or receivedfrom I/O device(s) 126. Various elements of computer 101 may communicatevia one or more communication buses, shown as communication bus 150.

Computer 101 as shown in FIG. 1 is shown merely as an example, asclients, servers, intermediary and other networking devices and may beimplemented by any computing or processing environment and with any typeof machine or set of machines that may have suitable hardware and/orsoftware capable of operating as described herein. Processor(s) 103 maybe implemented by one or more programmable processors to execute one ormore executable instructions, such as a computer program, to perform thefunctions of the system. As used herein, the term “processor” describescircuitry that performs a function, an operation, or a sequence ofoperations. The function, operation, or sequence of operations may behard coded into the circuitry or soft coded by way of instructions heldin a memory device and executed by the circuitry. A “processor” mayperform the function, operation, or sequence of operations using digitalvalues and/or using analog signals. In some embodiments, the “processor”can be embodied in one or more application specific integrated circuits(ASICs), microprocessors, digital signal processors (DSPs), graphicsprocessing units (GPUs), microcontrollers, field programmable gatearrays (FPGAs), programmable logic arrays (PLAs), multi-core processors,or general-purpose computers with associated memory. The “processor” maybe analog, digital or mixed-signal. In some embodiments, the “processor”may be one or more physical processors or one or more “virtual” (e.g.,remotely located or “cloud”) processors. A processor including multipleprocessor cores and/or multiple processors multiple processors mayprovide functionality for parallel, simultaneous execution ofinstructions or for parallel, simultaneous execution of one instructionon more than one piece of data.

Communications interfaces 118 may include one or more interfaces toenable computer 101 to access a computer network such as a Local AreaNetwork (LAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a Personal Area Network (PAN),or the Internet through a variety of wired and/or wireless or cellularconnections.

In described embodiments, the computing device 101 may execute anapplication on behalf of a user of a client computing device. Forexample, the computing device 101 may execute a virtual machine, whichprovides an execution session within which applications execute onbehalf of a user or a client computing device, such as a hosted desktopsession. The computing device 101 may also execute a terminal servicessession to provide a hosted desktop environment. The computing device101 may provide access to a computing environment including one or moreof: one or more applications, one or more desktop applications, and oneor more desktop sessions in which one or more applications may execute.

Additional details of the implementation and operation of networkenvironment, computer 101 and client and server computers may be asdescribed in U.S. Pat. No. 9,538,345, issued Jan. 3, 2017 to CitrixSystems, Inc. of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the teachings of which arehereby incorporated herein by reference.

B. Systems and Methods for an Embedded Browser

The present disclosure is directed towards systems and methods of anembedded browser. A client application executing on a client device canallow a user to access applications (apps) that are served from and/orhosted on one or more servers, such as web applications andsoftware-as-a-service (SaaS) applications (hereafter sometimes generallyreferred to as network applications). A browser that is embedded orintegrated with the client application can render to the user a networkapplication that is accessed or requested via the client application,and can enable interactivity between the user and the networkapplication. The browser is sometimes referred to as an embeddedbrowser, and the client application with embedded browser (CEB) issometimes referred to as a workspace application. The client applicationcan establish a secure connection to the one or more servers to providean application session for the user to access the network applicationusing the client device and the embedded browser. The embedded browsercan be integrated with the client application to ensure that trafficrelated to the network application is routed through and/or processed inthe client application, which can provide the client application withreal-time visibility to the traffic (e.g., when decrypted through theclient application), and user interactions and behavior. The embeddedbrowser can provide a seamless experience to a user as the networkapplication is requested via the user interface (shared by the clientapplication and the embedded browser) and rendered through the embeddedbrowser within the same user interface.

The client application can terminate one end of a secured connectionestablished with a server of a network application, such as a securesockets layer (SSL) virtual private network (VPN) connection. The clientapplication can receive encrypted traffic from the network application,and can decrypt the traffic before further processing (e.g., renderingby the embedded browser). The client application can monitor thereceived traffic (e.g., in encrypted packet form), and also have fullvisibility into the decrypted data stream and/or the SSL stack. Thisvisibility can allow the client application to perform or facilitatepolicy-based management (e.g., including data loss prevention (DLP)capabilities), application control (e.g., to improve performance,service level), and collection and production of analytics. Forinstance, the local CEB can provide an information technology (IT)administrator with a controlled system for deploying web and SaaSapplications through the CEB, and allow the IT administrator to setpolicies or configurations via the CEB for performing any of theforgoing activities.

Many web and SaaS delivered applications connect from web servers togeneric browsers (e.g., Internet Explorer, Firefox, and so on) of users.Once authenticated, the entire session of such a network application isencrypted. However, in this scenario, an administrator may not havevisibility, analytics, or control of the content entering the networkapplication from the user's digital workspace, or the content leavingthe network application and entering the user's digital workspace.Moreover, content of a network application viewed in a generic browsercan be copied or downloaded (e.g., by a user or program) to potentiallyany arbitrary application or device, resulting in a possible breach indata security.

This present systems and methods can ensure that traffic associated witha network application is channeled through a CEB. By way ofillustration, when a user accesses a SaaS web service with securityassertion markup language (SAML) enabled for instance, the correspondingaccess request can be forwarded to a designated gateway service thatdetermines, checks or verifies if the CEB was used to make the accessrequest. Responsive to determining that a CEB was used to make theaccess request, the gateway service can perform or provideauthentication and single-sign-on (SSO), and can allow the CEB toconnect directly to the SaaS web service. Encryption (e.g., standardencryption) can be used for the application session between the CEB andthe SaaS web service. When the content from the web service isunencrypted in the CEB to the viewed via the embedded browser, and/orwhen input is entered via the CEB, the CEB can provide added services onselective application-related information for control and analytics forinstance. For example, an analytics agent or application programminginterface (API) can be embedded in the CEB to provide or perform theadded services.

The CEB (sometimes referred to as workspace application or receiver) caninteroperate with one or more gateway services, intermediaries and/ornetwork servers (sometimes collectively referred to as cloud services orCitrix Cloud) to provide access to a network application. Features andelements of an environment related to the operation of an embodiment ofcloud services are described below.

FIG. 2 illustrates an embodiment of cloud services for use in accessingresources including network applications. The cloud services can includean enterprise mobility technical architecture 200, which can include anaccess gateway 260 in one illustrative embodiment. The architecture canbe used in a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) environment for instance. Thearchitecture can enable a user of a client device 202 (e.g., a mobile orother device) to both access enterprise or personal resources from aclient device 202, and use the client device 202 for personal use. Theuser may access such enterprise resources 204 or enterprise services 208via a client application executing on the client device 202. The usermay access such enterprise resources 204 or enterprise services 208using a client device 202 that is purchased by the user or a clientdevice 202 that is provided by the enterprise to user. The user mayutilize the client device 202 for business use only or for business andpersonal use. The client device may run an iOS operating system, andAndroid operating system, or the like. The enterprise may choose toimplement policies to manage the client device 202. The policies may beimplanted through a firewall or gateway in such a way that the clientdevice may be identified, secured or security verified, and providedselective or full access to the enterprise resources. The policies maybe client device management policies, mobile application managementpolicies, mobile data management policies, or some combination of clientdevice, application, and data management policies. A client device 202that is managed through the application of client device managementpolicies may be referred to as an enrolled device. The client devicemanagement policies can be applied via the client application forinstance.

In some embodiments, the operating system of the client device may beseparated into a managed partition 210 and an unmanaged partition 212.The managed partition 210 may have policies applied to it to secure theapplications running on and data stored in the managed partition. Theapplications running on the managed partition may be secureapplications. In other embodiments, all applications may execute inaccordance with a set of one or more policy files received separate fromthe application, and which define one or more security parameters,features, resource restrictions, and/or other access controls that areenforced by the client device management system when that application isexecuting on the device. By operating in accordance with theirrespective policy file(s), each application may be allowed or restrictedfrom communications with one or more other applications and/orresources, thereby creating a virtual partition. Thus, as used herein, apartition may refer to a physically partitioned portion of memory(physical partition), a logically partitioned portion of memory (logicalpartition), and/or a virtual partition created as a result ofenforcement of one or more policies and/or policy files across multipleapps as described herein (virtual partition). Stated differently, byenforcing policies on managed apps, those apps may be restricted to onlybe able to communicate with other managed apps and trusted enterpriseresources, thereby creating a virtual partition that is not accessibleby unmanaged apps and devices.

The secure applications may be email applications, web browsingapplications, software-as-a-service (SaaS) access applications, WindowsApplication access applications, and the like. The client applicationcan include a secure application launcher 218. The secure applicationsmay be secure native applications 214, secure remote applications 222executed by the secure application launcher 218, virtualizationapplications 226 executed by the secure application launcher 218, andthe like. The secure native applications 214 may be wrapped by a secureapplication wrapper 220. The secure application wrapper 220 may includeintegrated policies that are executed on the client device 202 when thesecure native application is executed on the device. The secureapplication wrapper 220 may include meta-data that points the securenative application 214 running on the client device 202 to the resourceshosted at the enterprise that the secure native application 214 mayrequire to complete the task requested upon execution of the securenative application 214. The secure remote applications 222 executed by asecure application launcher 218 may be executed within the secureapplication launcher application 218. The virtualization applications226 executed by a secure application launcher 218 may utilize resourceson the client device 202, at the enterprise resources 204, and the like.The resources used on the client device 202 by the virtualizationapplications 226 executed by a secure application launcher 218 mayinclude user interaction resources, processing resources, and the like.The user interaction resources may be used to collect and transmitkeyboard input, mouse input, camera input, tactile input, audio input,visual input, gesture input, and the like. The processing resources maybe used to present a user interface, process data received from theenterprise resources 204, and the like. The resources used at theenterprise resources 204 by the virtualization applications 226 executedby a secure application launcher 218 may include user interfacegeneration resources, processing resources, and the like. The userinterface generation resources may be used to assemble a user interface,modify a user interface, refresh a user interface, and the like. Theprocessing resources may be used to create information, readinformation, update information, delete information, and the like. Forexample, the virtualization application may record user interactionsassociated with a graphical user interface (GUI) and communicate them toa server application where the server application may use the userinteraction data as an input to the application operating on the server.In this arrangement, an enterprise may elect to maintain the applicationon the server side as well as data, files, etc., associated with theapplication. While an enterprise may elect to “mobilize” someapplications in accordance with the principles herein by securing themfor deployment on the client device (e.g., via the client application),this arrangement may also be elected for certain applications. Forexample, while some applications may be secured for use on the clientdevice, others might not be prepared or appropriate for deployment onthe client device so the enterprise may elect to provide the mobile useraccess to the unprepared applications through virtualization techniques.As another example, the enterprise may have large complex applicationswith large and complex data sets (e.g., material resource planningapplications) where it would be very difficult, or otherwiseundesirable, to customize the application for the client device so theenterprise may elect to provide access to the application throughvirtualization techniques. As yet another example, the enterprise mayhave an application that maintains highly secured data (e.g., humanresources data, customer data, engineering data) that may be deemed bythe enterprise as too sensitive for even the secured mobile environmentso the enterprise may elect to use virtualization techniques to permitmobile access to such applications and data. An enterprise may elect toprovide both fully secured and fully functional applications on theclient device. The enterprise can use a client application, which caninclude a virtualization application, to allow access to applicationsthat are deemed more properly operated on the server side. In anembodiment, the virtualization application may store some data, files,etc., on the mobile phone in one of the secure storage locations. Anenterprise, for example, may elect to allow certain information to bestored on the phone while not permitting other information.

In connection with the virtualization application, as described herein,the client device may have a virtualization application that is designedto present GUIs and then record user interactions with the GUI. Thevirtualization application may communicate the user interactions to theserver side to be used by the server side application as userinteractions with the application. In response, the application on theserver side may transmit back to the client device a new GUI. Forexample, the new GUI may be a static page, a dynamic page, an animation,or the like, thereby providing access to remotely located resources.

The secure applications may access data stored in a secure datacontainer 228 in the managed partition 210 of the client device. Thedata secured in the secure data container may be accessed by the securewrapped applications 214, applications executed by a secure applicationlauncher 222, virtualization applications 226 executed by a secureapplication launcher 218, and the like. The data stored in the securedata container 228 may include files, databases, and the like. The datastored in the secure data container 228 may include data restricted to aspecific secure application 230, shared among secure applications 232,and the like. Data restricted to a secure application may include securegeneral data 234 and highly secure data 238. Secure general data may usea strong form of encryption such as Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)128-bit encryption or the like, while highly secure data 238 may use avery strong form of encryption such as AES 256-bit encryption. Datastored in the secure data container 228 may be deleted from the deviceupon receipt of a command from the device manager 224. The secureapplications may have a dual-mode option 240. The dual mode option 240may present the user with an option to operate the secured applicationin an unsecured or unmanaged mode. In an unsecured or unmanaged mode,the secure applications may access data stored in an unsecured datacontainer 242 on the unmanaged partition 212 of the client device 202.The data stored in an unsecured data container may be personal data 244.The data stored in an unsecured data container 242 may also be accessedby unsecured applications 248 that are running on the unmanagedpartition 212 of the client device 202. The data stored in an unsecureddata container 242 may remain on the client device 202 when the datastored in the secure data container 228 is deleted from the clientdevice 202. An enterprise may want to delete from the client deviceselected or all data, files, and/or applications owned, licensed orcontrolled by the enterprise (enterprise data) while leaving orotherwise preserving personal data, files, and/or applications owned,licensed or controlled by the user (personal data). This operation maybe referred to as a selective wipe. With the enterprise and personaldata arranged in accordance to the aspects described herein, anenterprise may perform a selective wipe.

The client device 202 may connect to enterprise resources 204 andenterprise services 208 at an enterprise, to the public Internet 248,and the like. The client device may connect to enterprise resources 204and enterprise services 208 through virtual private network connections.The virtual private network connections, also referred to as microVPN orapplication-specific VPN, may be specific to particular applications(e.g., as illustrated by microVPNs 250), particular devices, particularsecured areas on the client device (e.g., as illustrated by O/S VPN252), and the like. For example, each of the wrapped applications in thesecured area of the phone may access enterprise resources through anapplication specific VPN such that access to the VPN would be grantedbased on attributes associated with the application, possibly inconjunction with user or device attribute information. The virtualprivate network connections may carry Microsoft Exchange traffic,Microsoft Active Directory traffic, HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP)traffic, HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) traffic, applicationmanagement traffic, and the like. The virtual private networkconnections may support and enable single-sign-on authenticationprocesses 254. The single-sign-on processes may allow a user to providea single set of authentication credentials, which are then verified byan authentication service 258. The authentication service 258 may thengrant to the user access to multiple enterprise resources 204, withoutrequiring the user to provide authentication credentials to eachindividual enterprise resource 204.

The virtual private network connections may be established and managedby an access gateway 260. The access gateway 260 may include performanceenhancement features that manage, accelerate, and improve the deliveryof enterprise resources 204 to the client device 202. The access gatewaymay also re-route traffic from the client device 202 to the publicInternet 248, enabling the client device 202 to access publiclyavailable and unsecured applications that run on the public Internet248. The client device may connect to the access gateway via a transportnetwork 262. The transport network 262 may use one or more transportprotocols and may be a wired network, wireless network, cloud network,local area network, metropolitan area network, wide area network, publicnetwork, private network, and the like.

The enterprise resources 204 may include email servers, file sharingservers, SaaS/Web applications, Web application servers, Windowsapplication servers, and the like. Email servers may include Exchangeservers, Lotus Notes servers, and the like. File sharing servers mayinclude ShareFile servers, and the like. SaaS applications may includeSalesforce, and the like.

Windows application servers may include any application server that isbuilt to provide applications that are intended to run on a localWindows operating system, and the like. The enterprise resources 204 maybe premise-based resources, cloud based resources, and the like. Theenterprise resources 204 may be accessed by the client device 202directly or through the access gateway 260. The enterprise resources 204may be accessed by the client device 202 via a transport network 262.The transport network 262 may be a wired network, wireless network,cloud network, local area network, metropolitan area network, wide areanetwork, public network, private network, and the like.

Cloud services can include an access gateway 260 and/or enterpriseservices 208. The enterprise services 208 may include authenticationservices 258, threat detection services 264, device manager services224, file sharing services 268, policy manager services 270, socialintegration services 272, application controller services 274, and thelike. Authentication services 258 may include user authenticationservices, device authentication services, application authenticationservices, data authentication services and the like. Authenticationservices 258 may use certificates. The certificates may be stored on theclient device 202, by the enterprise resources 204, and the like. Thecertificates stored on the client device 202 may be stored in anencrypted location on the client device, the certificate may betemporarily stored on the client device 202 for use at the time ofauthentication, and the like. Threat detection services 264 may includeintrusion detection services, unauthorized access attempt detectionservices, and the like. Unauthorized access attempt detection servicesmay include unauthorized attempts to access devices, applications, data,and the like. Device management services 224 may include configuration,provisioning, security, support, monitoring, reporting, anddecommissioning services. File sharing services 268 may include filemanagement services, file storage services, file collaboration services,and the like. Policy manager services 270 may include device policymanager services, application policy manager services, data policymanager services, and the like. Social integration services 272 mayinclude contact integration services, collaboration services,integration with social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, andLinkedIn, and the like. Application controller services 274 may includemanagement services, provisioning services, deployment services,assignment services, revocation services, wrapping services, and thelike.

The enterprise mobility technical architecture 200 may include anapplication store 278. The application store 278 may include unwrappedapplications 280, pre-wrapped applications 282, and the like.Applications may be populated in the application store 278 from theapplication controller 274. The application store 278 may be accessed bythe client device 202 through the access gateway 260, through the publicInternet 248, or the like. The application store may be provided with anintuitive and easy to use User Interface.

A software development kit 284 may provide a user the capability tosecure applications selected by the user by providing a secure wrapperaround the application. An application that has been wrapped using thesoftware development kit 284 may then be made available to the clientdevice 202 by populating it in the application store 278 using theapplication controller 274.

The enterprise mobility technical architecture 200 may include amanagement and analytics capability. The management and analyticscapability may provide information related to how resources are used,how often resources are used, and the like. Resources may includedevices, applications, data, and the like. How resources are used mayinclude which devices download which applications, which applicationsaccess which data, and the like. How often resources are used mayinclude how often an application has been downloaded, how many times aspecific set of data has been accessed by an application, and the like.

FIG. 3 depicts is an illustrative embodiment of an enterprise mobilitymanagement system 300. Some of the components of the mobility managementsystem 200 described above with reference to FIG. 2 have been omittedfor the sake of simplicity. The architecture of the system 300 depictedin FIG. 3 is similar in many respects to the architecture of the system200 described above with reference to FIG. 2 and may include additionalfeatures not mentioned above.

In this case, the left hand side represents an enrolled client device302 with a client agent 304, which interacts with gateway server 306 toaccess various enterprise resources 308 and services 309 such as Web orSasS applications, Exchange, Sharepoint, public-key infrastructure (PKI)Resources, Kerberos Resources, Certificate Issuance service, as shown onthe right hand side above. The gateway server 306 can includeembodiments of features and functionalities of the cloud services, suchas access gateway 260 and application controller functionality. Althoughnot specifically shown, the client agent 304 may be part of, and/orinteract with the client application which can operate as an enterpriseapplication store (storefront) for the selection and/or downloading ofnetwork applications.

The client agent 304 can act as a UI (user interface) intermediary forWindows apps/desktops hosted in an Enterprise data center, which areaccessed using the High-Definition User Experience (HDX) or IndependentComputing Architecture (ICA) display remoting protocol. The client agent304 can also support the installation and management of nativeapplications on the client device 302, such as native iOS or Androidapplications. For example, the managed applications 310 (mail, browser,wrapped application) shown in the figure above are native applicationsthat execute locally on the device. Client agent 304 and applicationmanagement framework of this architecture act to provide policy drivenmanagement capabilities and features such as connectivity and SSO(single sign on) to enterprise resources/services 308. The client agent304 handles primary user authentication to the enterprise, for instanceto access gateway (AG) with SSO to other gateway server components. Theclient agent 304 obtains policies from gateway server 306 to control thebehavior of the managed applications 310 on the client device 302.

The Secure interprocess communication (IPC) links 312 between the nativeapplications 310 and client agent 304 represent a management channel,which allows client agent to supply policies to be enforced by theapplication management framework 314 “wrapping” each application. TheIPC channel 312 also allows client agent 304 to supply credential andauthentication information that enables connectivity and SSO toenterprise resources 308. Finally the IPC channel 312 allows theapplication management framework 314 to invoke user interface functionsimplemented by client agent 304, such as online and offlineauthentication.

Communications between the client agent 304 and gateway server 306 areessentially an extension of the management channel from the applicationmanagement framework 314 wrapping each native managed application 310.The application management framework 314 requests policy informationfrom client agent 304, which in turn requests it from gateway server306. The application management framework 314 requests authentication,and client agent 304 logs into the gateway services part of gatewayserver 306 (also known as NetScaler access gateway). Client agent 304may also call supporting services on gateway server 306, which mayproduce input material to derive encryption keys for the local datavaults 316, or provide client certificates which may enable directauthentication to PKI protected resources, as more fully explainedbelow.

In more detail, the application management framework 314 “wraps” eachmanaged application 310. This may be incorporated via an explicit buildstep, or via a post-build processing step. The application managementframework 314 may “pair” with client agent 304 on first launch of anapplication 310 to initialize the Secure IPC channel and obtain thepolicy for that application. The application management framework 314may enforce relevant portions of the policy that apply locally, such asthe client agent login dependencies and some of the containment policiesthat restrict how local OS services may be used, or how they mayinteract with the application 310.

The application management framework 314 may use services provided byclient agent 304 over the Secure IPC channel 312 to facilitateauthentication and internal network access. Key management for theprivate and shared data vaults 316 (containers) may be also managed byappropriate interactions between the managed applications 310 and clientagent 304. Vaults 316 may be available only after online authentication,or may be made available after offline authentication if allowed bypolicy. First use of vaults 316 may require online authentication, andoffline access may be limited to at most the policy refresh periodbefore online authentication is again required.

Network access to internal resources may occur directly from individualmanaged applications 310 through access gateway 306. The applicationmanagement framework 314 is responsible for orchestrating the networkaccess on behalf of each application 310. Client agent 304 mayfacilitate these network connections by providing suitable time limitedsecondary credentials obtained following online authentication. Multiplemodes of network connection may be used, such as reverse web proxyconnections and end-to-end VPN-style tunnels 318.

The Mail and Browser managed applications 310 can have special statusand may make use of facilities that might not be generally available toarbitrary wrapped applications. For example, the Mail application mayuse a special background network access mechanism that allows it toaccess Exchange over an extended period of time without requiring a fullAG logon. The Browser application may use multiple private data vaultsto segregate different kinds of data.

This architecture can support the incorporation of various othersecurity features. For example, gateway server 306 (including itsgateway services) in some cases might not need to validate activedirectory (AD) passwords. It can be left to the discretion of anenterprise whether an AD password is used as an authentication factorfor some users in some situations. Different authentication methods maybe used if a user is online or offline (i.e., connected or not connectedto a network).

Step up authentication is a feature wherein gateway server 306 mayidentify managed native applications 310 that are allowed to have accessto more sensitive data using strong authentication, and ensure thataccess to these applications is only permitted after performingappropriate authentication, even if this means a re-authentication isrequested from the user after a prior weaker level of login.

Another security feature of this solution is the encryption of the datavaults 316 (containers) on the client device 302. The vaults 316 may beencrypted so that all on-device data including clipboard/cache data,files, databases, and configurations are protected. For on-line vaults,the keys may be stored on the server (gateway server 306), and foroff-line vaults, a local copy of the keys may be protected by a userpassword or biometric validation. When data is stored locally on thedevice 302 in the secure container 316, it is preferred that a minimumof AES 256 encryption algorithm be utilized.

Other secure container features may also be implemented. For example, alogging feature may be included, wherein all security events happeninginside an application 310 are logged and reported to the backend. Datawiping may be supported, such as if the application 310 detectstampering, associated encryption keys may be written over with randomdata, leaving no hint on the file system that user data was destroyed.Screenshot protection is another feature, where an application mayprevent any data from being stored in screenshots. For example, the keywindow's hidden property may be set to YES. This may cause whatevercontent is currently displayed on the screen to be hidden, resulting ina blank screenshot where any content would normally reside.

Local data transfer may be prevented, such as by preventing any datafrom being locally transferred outside the application container, e.g.,by copying it or sending it to an external application. A keyboard cachefeature may operate to disable the autocorrect functionality forsensitive text fields. SSL certificate validation may be operable so theapplication specifically validates the server SSL certificate instead ofit being stored in the keychain. An encryption key generation featuremay be used such that the key used to encrypt data on the device isgenerated using a passphrase or biometric data supplied by the user (ifoffline access is required). It may be XORed with another key randomlygenerated and stored on the server side if offline access is notrequired. Key Derivation functions may operate such that keys generatedfrom the user password use KDFs (key derivation functions, notablyPassword-Based Key Derivation Function 2 (PBKDF2)) rather than creatinga cryptographic hash of it. The latter makes a key susceptible to bruteforce or dictionary attacks.

Further, one or more initialization vectors may be used in encryptionmethods. An initialization vector might cause multiple copies of thesame encrypted data to yield different cipher text output, preventingboth replay and cryptanalytic attacks. This may also prevent an attackerfrom decrypting any data even with a stolen encryption key. Further,authentication then decryption may be used, wherein application data isdecrypted only after the user has authenticated within the application.Another feature may relate to sensitive data in memory, which may bekept in memory (and not in disk) only when it's needed. For example,login credentials may be wiped from memory after login, and encryptionkeys and other data inside objective-C instance variables are notstored, as they may be easily referenced. Instead, memory may bemanually allocated for these.

An inactivity timeout may be implemented via the CEB, wherein after apolicy-defined period of inactivity, a user session is terminated.

Data leakage from the application management framework 314 may beprevented in other ways. For example, when an application 310 is put inthe background, the memory may be cleared after a predetermined(configurable) time period. When backgrounded, a snapshot may be takenof the last displayed screen of the application to fasten theforegrounding process. The screenshot may contain confidential data andhence should be cleared.

Another security feature relates to the use of an OTP (one timepassword) 320 without the use of an AD (active directory) 322 passwordfor access to one or more applications. In some cases, some users do notknow (or are not permitted to know) their AD password, so these usersmay authenticate using an OTP 320 such as by using a hardware OTP systemlike SecurID (OTPs may be provided by different vendors also, such asEntrust or Gemalto). In some cases, after a user authenticates with auser ID, a text is sent to the user with an OTP 320. In some cases, thismay be implemented only for online use, with a prompt being a singlefield.

An offline password may be implemented for offline authentication forthose applications 310 for which offline use is permitted via enterprisepolicy. For example, an enterprise may want storefront to be accessed inthis manner. In this case, the client agent 304 may require the user toset a custom offline password and the AD password is not used. Gatewayserver 306 may provide policies to control and enforce passwordstandards with respect to the minimum length, character classcomposition, and age of passwords, such as described by the standardWindows Server password complexity requirements, although theserequirements may be modified.

Another feature relates to the enablement of a client side certificatefor certain applications 310 as secondary credentials (for the purposeof accessing PKI protected web resources via the application managementframework micro VPN feature). For example, an application may utilizesuch a certificate. In this case, certificate-based authentication usingActiveSync protocol may be supported, wherein a certificate from theclient agent 304 may be retrieved by gateway server 306 and used in akeychain. Each managed application may have one associated clientcertificate, identified by a label that is defined in gateway server306.

Gateway server 306 may interact with an Enterprise special purpose webservice to support the issuance of client certificates to allow relevantmanaged applications to authenticate to internal PKI protectedresources.

The client agent 304 and the application management framework 314 may beenhanced to support obtaining and using client certificates forauthentication to internal PKI protected network resources. More thanone certificate may be supported, such as to match various levels ofsecurity and/or separation requirements. The certificates may be used bythe Mail and Browser managed applications, and ultimately by arbitrarywrapped applications (provided those applications use web service stylecommunication patterns where it is reasonable for the applicationmanagement framework to mediate https requests).

Application management client certificate support on iOS may rely onimporting a public-key cryptography standards (PKCS) 12 BLOB (BinaryLarge Object) into the iOS keychain in each managed application for eachperiod of use. Application management framework client certificatesupport may use a HTTPS implementation with private in-memory keystorage. The client certificate might never be present in the iOSkeychain and might not be persisted except potentially in “online-only”data value that is strongly protected.

Mutual SSL or TLS may also be implemented to provide additional securityby requiring that a client device 302 is authenticated to theenterprise, and vice versa. Virtual smart cards for authentication togateway server 306 may also be implemented.

Both limited and full Kerberos support may be additional features. Thefull support feature relates to an ability to do full Kerberos login toActive Directory (AD) 322, using an AD password or trusted clientcertificate, and obtain Kerberos service tickets to respond to HTTPNegotiate authentication challenges. The limited support feature relatesto constrained delegation in Citrix Access Gateway Enterprise Edition(AGEE), where AGEE supports invoking Kerberos protocol transition so itcan obtain and use Kerberos service tickets (subject to constraineddelegation) in response to HTTP Negotiate authentication challenges.This mechanism works in reverse web proxy (aka corporate virtual privatenetwork (CVPN)) mode, and when http (but not https) connections areproxied in VPN and MicroVPN mode.

Another feature relates to application container locking and wiping,which may automatically occur upon jail-break or rooting detections, andoccur as a pushed command from administration console, and may include aremote wipe functionality even when an application 310 is not running.

A multi-site architecture or configuration of enterprise applicationstore and an application controller may be supported that allows usersto be service from one of several different locations in case offailure.

In some cases, managed applications 310 may be allowed to access acertificate and private key via an API (example OpenSSL). Trustedmanaged applications 310 of an enterprise may be allowed to performspecific Public Key operations with an application's client certificateand private key. Various use cases may be identified and treatedaccordingly, such as when an application behaves like a browser and nocertificate access is used, when an application reads a certificate for“who am I,” when an application uses the certificate to build a securesession token, and when an application uses private keys for digitalsigning of important data (e.g., transaction log) or for temporary dataencryption.

Referring now to FIG. 4, depicted is a block diagram of a system 400 ofan embedded browser. In brief overview, the system 400 may include aclient device 402 with a digital workspace for a user, a clientapplication 404, cloud services 408 operating on at least one networkdevice 432, and network applications 406 served from and/or hosted onone or more servers 430. The client application 404 can for instanceinclude at least one of: an embedded browser 410, a networking agent412, a cloud services agent 414, a remote session agent 416, or a securecontainer 418. The cloud services 408 can for instance include at leastone of: secure browser(s) 420, an access gateway 422 (or CIS, e.g., forregistering and/or authenticating the client application and/or user),or analytics services 424 (or CAS, e.g., for receiving information fromthe client application for analytics). The network applications 406 caninclude sanctioned applications 426 and non-sanctioned applications 428.

Each of the above-mentioned elements or entities is implemented inhardware, or a combination of hardware and software, in one or moreembodiments. Each component of the system 400 may be implemented usinghardware or a combination of hardware or software detailed above inconnection with FIG. 1. For instance, each of these elements or entitiescan include any application, program, library, script, task, service,process or any type and form of executable instructions executing onhardware of the client device 402, the at least one network device 432and/or the one or more servers 430. The hardware includes circuitry suchas one or more processors in one or more embodiments. For example, theat least one network device 432 and/or the one or more servers 430 caninclude any of the elements of a computing device described above inconnection with at least FIG. 1 for instance.

The client device 402 can include any embodiment of a computing devicedescribed above in connection with at least FIG. 1 for instance. Theclient device 402 can include any user device such as a desktopcomputer, a laptop computer, a tablet device, a smart phone, or anyother mobile or personal device. The client device 402 can include adigital workspace of a user, which can include file system(s), cache ormemory (e.g., including electronic clipboard(s)), container(s),application(s) and/or other resources on the client device 402. Thedigital workspace can include or extend to one or more networksaccessible by the client device 402, such as an intranet and theInternet, including file system(s) and/or other resources accessible viathe one or more networks. A portion of the digital workspace can besecured via the use of the client application 404 with embedded browser410 (CEB) for instance. The secure portion of the digital workspace caninclude for instance file system(s), cache or memory (e.g., includingelectronic clipboard(s)), application(s), container(s) and/or otherresources allocated to the CEB, and/or allocated by the CEB to networkapplication(s) 406 accessed via the CEB. The secure portion of thedigital workspace can also include resources specified by the CEB (viaone or more policies) for inclusion in the secure portion of the digitalworkspace (e.g., a particular local application can be specified via apolicy to be allowed to receive data obtained from a networkapplication).

The client application 404 can include one or more components, such asan embedded browser 410, a networking agent 412, a cloud services agent414 (sometimes referred to as management agent), a remote session agent416 (sometimes referred to as HDX engine), and/or a secure container 418(sometimes referred to as secure cache container). One or more of thecomponents can be installed as part of a software build or release ofthe client application 404 or CEB, or separately acquired or downloadedand installed/integrated into an existing installation of the clientapplication 404 or CEB for instance. For instance, the client device maydownload or otherwise receive the client application 404 (or anycomponent) from the network device(s) 432. In some embodiments, theclient device may send a request for the client application 404 to thenetwork device(s) 432. For example, a user of the client device caninitiate a request, download and/or installation of the clientapplication. The network device(s) 432 in turn may send the clientapplication to the client device. In some embodiments, the networkdevice(s) 432 may send a setup or installation application for theclient application to the client device. Upon receipt, the client devicemay install the client application onto a hard disk of the clientdevice. In some embodiments, the client device may run the setupapplication to unpack or decompress a package of the client application.In some embodiments, the client application may be an extension (e.g.,an add-on, an add-in, an applet or a plug-in) to another application(e.g., a networking agent 412) installed on the client device. Theclient device may install the client application to interface orinter-operate with the pre-installed application. In some embodiments,the client application may be a standalone application. The clientdevice may install the client application to execute as a separateprocess.

The embedded browser 410 can include elements and functionalities of aweb browser application or engine. The embedded browser 410 can locallyrender network application(s) as a component or extension of the clientapplication. For instance, the embedded browser 410 can render aSaaS/Web application inside the CEB which can provide the CEB with fullvisibility and control of the application session. The embedded browsercan be embedded or incorporated into the client application via anymeans, such as direct integration (e.g., programming language or scriptinsertion) into the executable code of the client application, or viaplugin installation. For example, the embedded browser can include aChromium based browser engine or other type of browser engine, that canbe embedded into the client application, using the Chromium embeddedframework (CEF) for instance. The embedded browser can include aHTML5-based layout graphical user interface (GUI). The embedded browsercan provide HTML rendering and JavaScript support to a clientapplication incorporating various programming languages. For example,elements of the embedded browser can bind to a client applicationincorporating C, C++, Delphi, Go, Java, .NET/Mono, Visual Basic 6.0,and/or Python.

In some embodiments, the embedded browser comprises a plug-in installedon the client application. For example, the plug-in can include one ormore components. One such components can be an ActiveX control or Javacontrol or any other type and/or form of executable instructions capableof loading into and executing in the client application. For example,the client application can load and run an Active X control of theembedded browser, such as in a memory space or context of the clientapplication. In some embodiments, the embedded browser can be installedas an extension on the client application, and a user can choose toenable or disable the plugin or extension. The embedded browser (e.g.,via the plugin or extension) can form or operate as a secured browserfor securing, using and/or accessing resources within the securedportion of the digital workspace.

The embedded browser can incorporate code and functionalities beyondthat available or possible in a standard or typical browser. Forinstance, the embedded browser can bind with or be assigned with asecured container 418, to define at least part of the secured portion ofa user's digital workspace. The embedded browser can bind with or beassigned with a portion of the client device's cache to form a securedclipboard (e.g., local to the client device, or extendable to otherdevices), that can be at least part of the secured container 418. Theembedded browser can be integrated with the client application to ensurethat traffic related to network applications is routed through and/orprocessed in the client application, which can provide the clientapplication with real-time visibility to the traffic (e.g., whendecrypted through the client application). This visibility to thetraffic can allow the client application to perform or facilitatepolicy-based management (e.g., including data loss prevention (DLP)capabilities), application control, and collection and production ofanalytics.

In some embodiments, the embedded browser incorporates one or more othercomponents of the client application 404, such as the cloud servicesagent 414, remote session agent 416 and/or secure container 418. Forinstance, a user can use the cloud services agent 414 of the embeddedbrowser to interoperate with the access gateway 422 (sometimes referredto as CIS) to access a network application. For example, the cloudservices agent 414 can execute within the embedded browser, and canreceive and transmit navigation commands from the embedded browser to ahosted network application. The cloud services agent can use a remotepresentation protocol to display the output generated by the networkapplication to the embedded browser. For example, the cloud servicesagent 414 can include a HTML5 web client that allows end users to accessremote desktops and/or applications on the embedded browser.

The client application 404 and CEB operate on the application layer ofthe operational (OSI) stack of the client device. The client application404 can include and/or execute one or more agents that interoperate withthe cloud services 408. The client application 404 can receive, obtain,retrieve or otherwise access various policies (e.g., an enterprise'scustom, specified or internal policies or rules) and/or data (e.g., froman access gateway 422 and/or network device(s) of cloud services 408, orother server(s), that may be managed by the enterprise). The clientapplication can access the policies and/or data to control and/or managea network application (e.g., a SaaS, web or remote-hosted application).Control and/or management of a network application can include controland/or management of various aspects of the network application, such asaccess control, session delivery, available features or functions,service level, traffic management and monitoring, and so on. The networkapplication can be from a provider or vendor of the enterprise (e.g.,salesforce.com, SAP, Microsoft Office 365), from the enterprise itself,or from another entity (e.g., Dropbox or Gmail service).

For example, the cloud services agent 414 can provide policy drivenmanagement capabilities and features related to the use and/or access ofnetwork applications. For example, the cloud services agent 414 caninclude a policy engine to apply one or more policies (e.g., receivedfrom cloud services) to determine access control and/or connectivity toresources such as network applications. When a session is establishedbetween the client application and a server 430 providing a SaaSapplication for instance, the cloud services agent 414 can apply one ormore policies to control traffic levels and/or traffic types (or otheraspects) of the session, for instance to manage a service level of theSaaS application. Additional aspects of the application traffic that canbe controlled or managed can include encryption level and/or encryptiontype applied to the traffic, level of interactivity allowed for a user,limited access to certain features of the network application (e.g.,print-screen, save, edit or copy functions), restrictions to use ortransfer of data obtained from the network application, limit concurrentaccess to two or more network applications, limit access to certain filerepositories or other resources, and so on.

The cloud services agent 414 can convey or feed information to analyticsservices 424 of the cloud services 408, such as information about SaaSinteraction events visible to the CEB. Such a configuration using theCEB can monitor or capture information for analytics without having aninline device or proxy located between the client device and theserver(s) 430, or using a SaaS API gateway ‘out-of-band’ approach. Insome embodiments, the cloud services agent 414 does not execute withinthe embedded browser. In these embodiments, a user can similarly use thecloud services agent 414 to interoperate with the access gateway (orCIS) 422 to access a network application. For instance, the cloudservices agent 414 can register and/or authenticate with the accessgateway (or CIS) 422, and can obtain a list of the network applicationsfrom the access gateway (or CIS) 422. The cloud services agent 414 caninclude and/or operate as an application store (or storefront) for userselection and/or downloading of network applications. Upon logging in toaccess a network application, the cloud services agent 414 can interceptand transmit navigation commands from the embedded browser to thenetwork application. The cloud services agent can use a remotepresentation protocol to display the output generated by the networkapplication to the embedded browser. For example, the cloud servicesagent 414 can include a HTML5 web client that allows end users to accessremote desktops and/or applications on the embedded browser.

In some embodiments, the cloud services agent 414 provides single signon (SSO) capability for the user and/or client device to access aplurality of network applications. The cloud services agent 414 canperform user authentication to access network applications as well asother network resources and services, by communicating with the accessgateway 422 for instance. For example, the cloud services agent 414 canauthenticate or register with the access gateway 422, to access othercomponents of the cloud services 408 and/or the network applications406. Responsive to the authentication or registration, the accessgateway 422 can perform authentication and/or SSO for (or on behalf of)the user and/or client application, with the network applications.

The client application 404 can include a networking agent 412. Thenetworking agent 412 is sometimes referred to as a software-defined widearea network (SD-WAN) agent, mVPN agent, or microVPN agent. Thenetworking agent 412 can establish or facilitate establishment of anetwork connection between the client application and one or moreresources (e.g., server 430 serving a network application). Thenetworking agent 412 can perform handshaking for a requested connectionfrom the client application to access a network application, and canestablish the requested connection (e.g., secure or encryptedconnection). The networking agent 412 can connect to enterpriseresources (including services) for instance via a virtual privatenetwork (VPN). For example, the networking agent 412 can establish asecure socket layer (SSL) VPN between the client application and aserver 430 providing the network application 406. The VPN connections,sometimes referred to as microVPN or application-specific VPN, may bespecific to particular network applications, particular devices,particular secured areas on the client device, and the like, forinstance as discussed above in connection with FIG. 3. Such VPNconnections can carry Microsoft Exchange traffic, Microsoft ActiveDirectory traffic, HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) traffic, HyperTextTransfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) traffic, as some examples.

The remote session agent 416 (sometimes referred to as HDX engine) caninclude features of the client agent 304 discussed above in connectionwith FIG. 2 for instance, to support display a remoting protocol (e.g.,HDX or ICA). In some embodiments, the remote session agent 416 canestablish a remote desktop session and/or remote application session inaccordance to any variety of protocols, such as the Remote DesktopProtocol (RDP), Appliance Link Protocol (ALP), Remote Frame Buffer (RFB)Protocol, and ICA Protocol. For example, the remote session agent 416can establish a remote application session for a user of the clientdevice to access an enterprise network application. The remote sessionagent 416 can establish the remote application session within or over asecure connection (e.g., a VPN) established by the networking agent 412for instance.

The client application or CEB can include or be associated with a securecontainer 418. A secure container can include a logical or virtualdelineation of one or more types of resources accessible within theclient device and/or accessible by the client device. For example, thesecure container 418 can refer to the entirety of the secured portion ofthe digital workspace, or particular aspect(s) of the secured portion.In some embodiments, the secure container 418 corresponds to a securecache (e.g., electronic or virtual clipboard), and can dynamicallyincorporate a portion of a local cache of each client device of a user,and/or a cloud-based cache of the user, that is protected or secured(e.g., encrypted). The secure container can define a portion of filesystem(s), and/or delineate resources allocated to a CEB and/or tonetwork applications accessed via the CEB. The secure container caninclude elements of the secure data container 228 discussed above inconnection with FIG. 2 for example. The CEB can be configured (e.g., viapolicies) to limit, disallow or disable certain actions or activities onresources and/or data identified to be within a secure container. Asecured container can be defined to specify that the resources and/ordata within the secure container are to be monitored for misuse, abuseand/or exfiltration.

In certain embodiments, a secure container relates to or involves theuse of a secure browser (e.g., embedded browser 410 or secure browser420) that implements various enterprise security features. Networkapplications (or web pages accessed by the secure browser) that areconfigured to run within the secure browser can effectively inherit thesecurity mechanisms implemented by the secure browser. These networkapplications can be considered to be contained within the securecontainer. The use of such a secure browser can enable an enterprise toimplement a content filtering policy in which, for example, employeesare blocked from accessing certain web sites from their client devices.The secure browser can be used, for example, to enable client deviceusers to access a corporate intranet without the need for a VPN.

In some embodiments, a secure container can support various types ofremedial actions for protecting enterprise resources. One such remedy isto lock the client device, or a secure container on the client devicethat stores data to be protected, such that the client device or securecontainer can only be unlocked with a valid code provided by anadministrator for instance. In some embodiments, these and other typesof remedies can be invoked automatically based on conditions detected onthe client device (via the application of policies for instance), or canbe remotely initiated by an administrator.

In some embodiments, a secure container can include a secure documentcontainer for documents. A document can comprise any computer-readablefile including text, audio, video, and/or other types of information ormedia. A document can comprise any single one or combination of thesemedia types. As explained herein, the secure container can help preventthe spread of enterprise information to different applications andcomponents of the client device, as well as to other devices. Theenterprise system (which can be partially or entirely within a cloudnetwork) can transmit documents to various devices, which can be storedwithin the secure container. The secure container can preventunauthorized applications and other components of the client device fromaccessing information within the secure container. For enterprises thatallow users to use their own client devices for accessing, storing, andusing enterprise data, providing secure container on the client deviceshelps to secure the enterprise data. For instance, providing securecontainers on the client devices can centralize enterprise data in onelocation on each client device, and can facilitate selective or completedeletion of enterprise data from each client device when desired.

The secure container can include an application that implements a filesystem that stores documents and/or other types of files. The filesystem can comprise a portion of a computer-readable memory of theclient device. The file system can be logically separated from otherportions of the computer-readable memory of the client device. In thisway, enterprise data can be stored in a secure container and privatedata can be stored in a separate portion of the computer-readable memoryof the client device for instance. The secure container can allow theCEB, network applications accessed via the CEB, locally installedapplications and/or other components of the client device to read from,write to, and/or delete information from the file system (if authorizedto do so). Deleting data from the secure container can include deletingactual data stored in the secure container, deleting pointers to datastored in the secure container, deleting encryption keys used to decryptdata stored in the secure container, and the like. The secure containercan be installed by, e.g., the client application, an administrator, orthe client device manufacturer. The secure container can enable some orall of the enterprise data stored in the file system to be deletedwithout modifying private data stored on the client device outside ofthe secure container. The file system can facilitate selective orcomplete deletion of data from the file system. For example, anauthorized component of the enterprise's system can delete data from thefile system based on, e.g., encoded rules. In some embodiments, theclient application can delete the data from the file system, in responseto receiving a deletion command from the enterprise's system.

The secure container can include an access manager that governs accessto the file system by applications and other components of the clientdevice. Access to the file system can be governed based on documentaccess policies (e.g., encoded rules) maintained by the clientapplication, in the documents and/or in the file system. A documentaccess policy can limit access to the file system based on (1) whichapplication or other component of the client device is requestingaccess, (2) which documents are being requested, (3) time or date, (4)geographical position of the client device, (5) whether the requestingapplication or other component provides a correct certificate orcredentials, (6) whether the user of the client device provides correctcredentials, (7) other conditions, or any combination thereof. A user'scredentials can comprise, for example, a password, one or more answersto security questions (e.g., What is the mascot of your high school?),biometric information (e.g., fingerprint scan, eye-scan), and the like.Hence, by using the access manager, the secure container can beconfigured to be accessed only by applications that are authorized toaccess the secure container. As one example, the access manager canenable enterprise applications installed on the client device to accessdata stored in the secure container and to prevent non-enterpriseapplications from accessing the data stored in the secure container.

Temporal and geographic restrictions on document access may be useful.For example, an administrator may deploy a document access policy thatrestricts the availability of the documents (stored within the securecontainer) to a specified time window and/or a geographic zone (e.g., asdetermined by a GPS chip) within which the client device must reside inorder to access the documents. Further, the document access policy caninstruct the secure container or client application to delete thedocuments from the secure container or otherwise make them unavailablewhen the specified time period expires or if the client device is takenoutside of the defined geographic zone.

Some documents can have access policies that forbid the document frombeing saved within the secure container. In such embodiments, thedocument can be available for viewing on the client device only when theuser is logged in or authenticated via the cloud services for example.

The access manager can also be configured to enforce certain modes ofconnectivity between remote devices (e.g., an enterprise resource orother enterprise server) and the secure container. For example, theaccess manager can require that documents received by the securecontainer from a remote device and/or sent from the secure container tothe remote device be transmitted through secured tunnels/connections,for example. The access manager can require that all documentstransmitted to and from the secure container be encrypted. The clientapplication or access manager can be configured to encrypt documentssent from the secure container and decrypt documents sent to the securecontainer. Documents in the secure container can also be stored in anencrypted form.

The secure container can be configured to prevent documents or dataincluded within documents or the secure container from being used byunauthorized applications or components of the client device or otherdevices. For instance, a client device application having authorizationto access documents from the secure container can be programmed toprevent a user from copying a document's data and pasting it intoanother file or application interface, or locally saving the document ordocument data as a new file outside of the secure container. Similarly,the secure container can include a document viewer and/or editor that donot permit such copy/paste and local save operations. Moreover, theaccess manager can be configured to prevent such copy/paste and localsave operations. Further, the secure container and applicationsprogrammed and authorized to access documents from the secure containercan be configured to prevent users from attaching such documents toemails or other forms of communication.

One or more applications (e.g., applications installed on the clientdevice, and/or network applications accessed via the CEB) can beprogrammed or controlled (e.g., via policy-based enforcement) to writeenterprise-related data only into the secure container. For instance, anapplication's source code can be provided with the resource name of thesecure container. Similarly, a remote application (e.g., executing on adevice other than the client device) can be configured to send data ordocuments only to the secure container (as opposed to other componentsor memory locations of the client device). Storing data to the securecontainer can occur automatically, for example, under control of theapplication, the client application, and/or the secure browser. Theclient application can be programmed to encrypt or decrypt documentsstored or to be stored within the secure container. In certainembodiments, the secure container can only be used by applications (onthe client device or a remote device) that are programmed to identifyand use the secure container, and which have authorization to do so.

The network applications 406 can include sanctioned network applications426 and non-sanctioned network applications 428. By way of anon-limiting example, sanctioned network applications 426 can includenetwork applications from Workday, Salesforce, Office 365, SAP, and soon, while non-sanctioned network applications 426 can include networkapplications from Dropbox, Gmail, and so on. For instance, FIG. 4illustrates a case where sanctioned applications 426 are accessed via aCEB. In operation (1), a user instance of a client application 404, thatis installed on client device 402, can register or authenticate with theaccess gateway 422 of cloud services 408. For example, the user canauthenticate the user to the client device and login to the clientdevice 402. The client application can automatically execute, or beactivated by the user. In some embodiments, the user can sign in to theclient application (e.g., by authenticating the user to the clientapplication). In response to the login or sign-in, the clientapplication can register or authenticate the user and/or the clientapplication with the access gateway 422.

In operation (2), in response to the registration or authentication, theaccess gateway 422 can identify or retrieve a list of enumerated networkapplications available or pre-assigned to the user, and can provide thelist to the client application. For example, in response to theregistration or authentication, the access gateway can identify the userand/or retrieve a user profile of the user. According to the identityand/or user profile, the access gateway can determine the list (e.g.,retrieve a stored list of network applications matched with the userprofile and/or the identity of the user). The list can correspond to alist of network applications sanctioned for the user. The access gatewaycan send the list to the client application or embedded browser, whichcan be presented via the client application or embedded browser to theuser (e.g., in a storefront user interface) for selection.

In operation (3), the user can initiate connection to a sanctionednetwork application (e.g., a SaaS application), by selecting from thelist of network applications presented to the user. For example, theuser can click on an icon or other representation of the sanctionednetwork application, displayed via the client application or embeddedbrowser. This user action can trigger the CEB to transmit a connectionor access request to a server that provisions the network application.The request can include a request to the server (e.g., SaaS provider) tocommunicate with the access gateway to authenticate the user. The servercan send a request to the access gateway to authenticate the user forexample.

In operation (4), the access gateway can perform SSO with the server, toauthenticate the user. For example, in response to the server's requestto authenticate the user, the access gateway can provide credentials ofthe user to the server(s) 430 for SSO, to access the selected networkapplication and/or other sanctioned network applications. In operation(5), the user can log into the selected network application, based onthe SSO (e.g., using the credentials). The client application (e.g., thenetworking agent 412 and/or the remote session agent 416) can establisha secure connection and session with the server(s) 430 to access theselected network application. The CEB can decrypt application trafficreceived via the secure connection. The CEB can monitor traffic sent viathe CEB and the secured connection to the servers 430.

In operation (6), the client application can provide information to theanalytics services 424 of cloud services 408, for analytics processing.For example, the cloud services agent 414 of the client application 404can monitor for or capture user interaction events with the selectednetwork application. The cloud services agent 414 can convey the userinteraction events to the analytics services 424, to be processed toproduce analytics.

FIG. 5 depicts an example embodiment of a system for using a securebrowser. In brief overview, the system includes cloud services 408,network applications 406 and client device 402. In some embodiments,various elements of the system are similar to that described above forFIG. 4, but that the client application (with embedded browser) is notavailable in the client device 402. A standard or typical browser may beavailable on the client device, from which a user can initiate a requestto access a sanctioned network application for instance. A networkapplication can be specified as being sanctioned or unsanctioned viapolicies that can be set by an administrator or automatically (e.g., viaartificial intelligence).

For example, in operation (1), the user may log into the networkapplication using the standard browser. For accessing a sanctionednetwork application, the user may access a predefined URL and/orcorresponding webpage of a server that provisions the networkapplication, via the standard browser, to initiate a request to accessthe network application. In some embodiments, the request can beforwarded to or intercepted by a designated gateway service (e.g., in adata path of the request). For example, the gateway service can resideon the client device (e.g., as an executable program), or can reside ona network device 432 of the cloud services 408 for instance. In someembodiments, the access gateway can correspond to or include the gatewayservice. The gateway service can determine if the requested networkapplication is a sanctioned network application. The gateway service candetermine if a CEB initiated the request. The gateway service can detector otherwise determine that the request is initiated from a source(e.g., initiated by the standard browser) in the client device otherthan a CEB. In some embodiments, there is no requirement for adesignated gateway service to detect or determine if the request isinitiated from a CEB, for example if the requested network applicationis sanctioned, that user is initiating the request via a standardbrowser, and/or that the predefined URL and/or corresponding webpage isaccessed.

In operation (2), the server may authenticate the user via the accessgateway of the cloud services 408. The server may communicate with theaccess gateway to authenticate the user, in response to the request. Forinstance, the request can include an indication to the server tocommunicate with the access gateway to authenticate the user. In someembodiments, the server is pre-configured to communicate with the accessgateway to authenticate the user, for requests to access a sanctionednetwork application. The server may send a request to the access gatewayto authenticate the user. In response to the server's request toauthenticate the user, the access gateway can provide credentials of theuser to the server 430.

In operation (3), the gateway service and/or the server can direct (orredirect) all traffic to a secure browser 420 which provides a securebrowsing service. This may be in response to at least one of: adetermination that the requested network application is a sanctionednetwork application, a determination that the request is initiated froma source other than a CEB, a determination that the requested networkapplication is sanctioned, a determination that user is initiating therequest via a standard browser, and/or a determination that thepredefined URL and/or corresponding webpage is accessed.

The user's URL session can be redirected to the secure browser. Forexample, the server, gateway service and/or the access gateway cangenerate and/or send a URL redirect message to the standard browser,responsive to the determination. The secure browser plug-in of thestandard browser can receive the URL redirect message, and can forexample send a request to access the non-sanctioned network application,to the secure browser 420. The secure browser 420 can direct the requestto the server of the non-sanctioned network application. The URLredirect message can instruct the standard browser (and/or the securebrowser plug-in) to direct traffic (e.g., destined for the networkapplication) from the standard browser to the secure browser 420 hostedon a network device. This can provide clientless access and control viadynamic routing though a secure browser service. In some embodiments, aredirection of all traffic to the secure browser 420 is initiated orconfigured, prior to performing authentication of the user (e.g., usingSSO) with the server.

In some embodiments, the gateway service can direct or request theserver of the requested network application to communicate with thesecure browser 420. For example, the gateway service can direct theserver and/or the secure browser to establish a secured connectionbetween the server and the secure browser, for establishing anapplication session for the network application.

In some embodiments, the secured browser 420 comprises a browser that ishosted on a network device 432 of the cloud services 408. The securedbrowser 420 can include one or more features of the secured browser 420described above in connection with at least FIG. 4 for instance. Thehosted browser can include an embedded browser of a CEB that is hostedon the network device 432 instead of on the client device. The hostedbrowser can include an embedded browser of a hosted virtualized versionof the CEB that is hosted on the network device 432. Similar to the CEBinstalled on the client device, traffic is routed through the CEB hostedon the network device, which allows an administrator to have visibilityof the traffic through the CEB and to remain in control for securitypolicy control, analytics, and/or management of performance.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example implementation for browser redirectionusing a secure browser plug-in. In brief overview, the implementationincludes a web browser 512 with a secure browser plug-in 516 operatingon a client device, and a hosted web browser (or secure browser) 522residing on a network device. The web browser 512 can correspond to astandard browser, instead of an embedded browser as discussed above inconnection with FIG. 4 for example. The secure browser plug-in 516 canexecute within a first network 510 and access a server 430 in a secondnetwork 530. The first network 510 and the second network 530 are forillustration purposes and may be replaced with fewer or additionalcomputer networks. A secure browser plug-in 516 can be installed on thestandard browser 512. The plug-in can include one or more components.One such component can include an ActiveX control or Java control or anyother type and/or form of executable instructions capable of loadinginto and executing in the standard browser. For example, the standardbrowser can load and run an Active X control of the secure browserplug-in 516, in a memory space or context of the standard browser. Insome embodiments, the secure browser plug-in can be installed as anextension on the standard browser, and a user can choose to enable ordisable the plugin or extension. The secure browser plug-in cancommunicate and/or operate with the secured browser 420 for securing,using and/or accessing resources within the secured portion of thedigital workspace.

By using the secure browser plug-in 516 operating within the standardbrowser 512 network applications accessed via the standard browser 512can be redirected to a hosted secure browser. For instance, the securebrowser plug-in 516 can be implemented and/or designed to detect that anetwork application is being accessed via the standard browser, and candirect/redirect traffic from the client device associated with thenetwork application, to the hosted secure browser. The hosted securebrowser can direct traffic received from the network application, to thesecure browser plug-in 516 and/or a client agent 514 for renderingand/or display for example. The client agent 514 can execute within theweb browser 512 and/or the secure browser plug-in, and can includecertain elements or features of the client application 404 discussedabove in connection with at least FIG. 4 for example. For instance, theclient agent 514 can include a remote session agent 416 for renderingthe network application at the web browser 512. In some embodiments, thenetwork application is rendered at the hosted secure browser, and therendered data is conveyed or mirrored to the secure browser plug-in 516and/or the client agent 514 for processing and/or display.

By way of an example, a user may be working remotely and may want toaccess a network application that is internal to a secure corporatenetwork while the user is working on a computing device connected to anunsecure network. In this case, the user may be utilizing the standardbrowser 512 executing in the first network 510, in which the firstnetwork 510 may comprise an unsecure network. The server 430 that theuser wants to access may be on the second network 530, in which thesecond network 530 comprises a secure corporate network for instance.The user might not be able to access the server 430 from the unsecurefirst network 510 by clicking on an internal uniform record locator(URL) for the secure website 532. That is, the user may need to utilizea different URL (e.g., an external URL) while executing the standardbrowser 512 from the external unsecure network 510. The external URL maybe directed to or may address one or more hosted web browsers 522configured to access server(s) 430 within the second network 530 (e.g.,secure network). To maintain secure access, the secure browser plug-in516 may redirect an internal URL to an external URL for a hosted securebrowser.

The secure browser plug-in 516 may be able to implement networkdetection in order to identify whether or not to redirect internal URLsto external URLs. The standard browser 512 may receive a requestcomprising an internal URL for a website executing within the securenetwork. For example, the standard browser 512 may receive the requestin response to a user entering a web address (e.g., for secure website532) in the standard browser. The secure browser plug-in 516 mayredirect the user web browser application 512 from the internal URL toan external URL for a hosted web browser application. For example, thesecure browser plug-in 516 may replace the internal URL with an externalURL for the hosted web browser application 522 executing within thesecure network 530.

The secure browser plug-in 516 may allow the client agent 514 to beconnected to the hosted web browser application 522. The client agent514 may comprise a plug-in component, such as an ActiveX control or Javacontrol or any other type and/or form of executable instructions capableof loading into and executing in the standard browser 512. For example,the client agent 514 may comprise an ActiveX control loaded and run by astandard browser 512, such as in the memory space or context of the userweb browser application 512. The client agent 514 may be pre-configuredto present the content of the hosted web browser application 522 withinthe user web browser application 512.

The client agent 514 may connect to a server or the cloud/hosted webbrowser service 520 using a thin-client or remote-display protocol topresent display output generated by the hosted web browser application522 executing on the service 520. The thin-client or remote-displayprotocol can be any one of the following non-exhaustive list ofprotocols: the Independent Computing Architecture (ICA) protocoldeveloped by Citrix Systems, Inc. of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; or the RemoteDesktop Protocol (RDP) manufactured by the Microsoft Corporation ofRedmond, Wash.

The hosted web browser application 522 may navigate to the requestednetwork application in full-screen mode, and can render the requestednetwork application. The client agent 514 may present the content orrendition of the network application on the web browser application 512in a seamless and transparent manner such that it appears that thecontent is being displayed by the standard browser 512, e.g., based onthe content being displayed in full screen mode. In other words, theuser may be given the impression that the web site content is displayedby the user web browser application 512 and not by the hosted webbrowser application 522. The client agent 514 may transmit navigationcommands generated by the user web browser application 512 to the hostedweb browser application 522 using the thin-client or remote-displayprotocol. Changes to the display output of the hosted web browserapplication 522, due to the navigation commands, may be reflected in theuser web browser application 512 by the client agent 514, giving theimpression to the user that the navigation commands were executed by theuser web browser application 512.

Referring again to FIG. 5, and in operation (4), a new browser tab canopen on the standard browser, to render or display the secure browsersession. The new browser tab can be established or opened by the securebrowser plug-in for instance. The secure browser plug-in and/or a clientagent can receive data from the secure browser session, and can renderthe network application within the new browser tab as discussed above inconnection with FIG. 6 for instance.

In operation (5), the secure browser can feed all user interactionevents via the network application, back to analytics service forprocessing. The secure browser plug-in can monitor for and intercept anyuser interaction events directed to the rendition of the networkapplication within the browser tab. Hence, a user can use a native (orstandard) browser to access a network application while allowingvisibility into the network application's traffic, via theinteroperation of cloud services and a secure browser (in the absence ofthe client application).

FIG. 7 depicts another example embodiment of a system of using a securebrowser. In brief overview, the system includes cloud services 408,network applications 406 and the client device 402. In some embodiments,various elements of the system are similar to that described above forFIG. 5. A client application with embedded browser is not available inthe client device 402. A standard or typical (e.g., HTML5) browser isavailable on the client device, from which a user can initiate a requestto access a non-sanctioned network application. A network applicationcan be specified as being sanctioned or non-sanctioned via policies thatcan be set by an administrator or automatically (e.g., via artificialintelligence).

In operation (1), the user may attempt to log into a non-sanctionednetwork application using the standard browser. The user may attempt toaccess a webpage of a server that provisions the network application,and to initiate a request to access the network application. In someembodiments, the request can be forwarded to or intercepted by adesignated gateway service (e.g., in a data path of the request). Forexample, the gateway service (sometimes referred to as SWG) can resideon the client device (e.g., as an executable program), or can reside ona network device 432 of the cloud services 408 for instance. The gatewayservice can detect or otherwise determine if the requested networkapplication is a sanctioned network application. The gateway service candetermine if a CEB initiated the request. The gateway service can detector otherwise determine that the request is initiated from a source(e.g., initiated by the standard browser) in the client device otherthan a CEB.

In operation (2), the gateway service detects that the requested networkapplication is a non-sanctioned network application. The gateway servicecan for instance extract information from the request (e.g., destinationaddress, name of the requested network application), and compare theinformation against that from a database of sanctioned and/ornon-sanctioned network applications. The gateway service can determine,based on the comparison, that the requested network application is anon-sanctioned network application.

In operation (3), responsive to the determination, the gateway servicecan block access to the requested network application, e.g., by blockingthe request. The gateway service can generate and/or send a URL redirectmessage to the standard browser, responsive to the determination. TheURL redirect message can be similar to a URL redirect message sent fromthe server to the standard browser in FIG. 5 in operation (3). A securebrowser plug-in of the standard browser can receive the URL redirectmessage, and can for example send a request to access the non-sanctionednetwork application, to the secure browser 420. The secure browser 420can direct the request to the server of the non-sanctioned networkapplication.

The server of the non-sanctioned network application may authenticatethe user via the access gateway of the cloud services 408, e.g.,responsive to receiving the request from the secure browser. The servermay communicate with the access gateway to authenticate the user, inresponse to the request. The server may send a request to the accessgateway to authenticate the user. In response to the server's request toauthenticate the user, the access gateway can provide credentials of theuser to the server 430. Upon authentication, the secure browser (or acorresponding CEB) can establish a secured connection and an applicationsession with the server.

In operation (4), a new browser tab can open on the standard browser, torender or display the secure browser's application session. The newbrowser tab can be established or opened by the secure browser plug-infor instance. The secure browser plug-in and/or a client agent canreceive data from the secure browser session, and can render the networkapplication within the new browser tab as discussed above in connectionwith FIGS. 5-6 for instance.

In operation (5), the secure browser can feed all user interactionevents via the network application, back to analytics service forprocessing. The secure browser plug-in can monitor for and intercept anyuser interaction events directed to the rendition of the networkapplication within the browser tab. Hence, a user can use a native (orstandard) browser to access a network application while allowingvisibility into the network application's traffic, via theinteroperation of cloud services and a secure browser (in the absence ofthe client application).

In some embodiments, in the absence or non-availability of a CEB on theclient device, browser redirection is performed so that each requestednetwork application is accessed via a corresponding hosted securebrowser (or hosted CEB) for handling, instead of having all trafficredirected through a single hosted secure browser (or hosted CEB). Eachdedicated secure browser can provide compartmentalization and improvedsecurity.

The use of a CEB, whether hosted or local to the client device, canallow for end-to-end visibility of application traffic for analytics,service level agreement (SLA), resource utilization, audit, and so on.In addition to such visibility, the CEB can be configured with policiesfor managing and controlling any of these as well as other aspects. Forexample, DLP features can be supported, to control “copy and paste”activities, download of files, sharing of files, and to implementwatermarking for instance. As another example, the CEB can be configuredwith policies for managing and controlling access to local drives and/ordevice resources such as peripherals.

Referring now to FIG. 8, an example embodiment of a system for usinglocal embedded browser(s) and hosted secured browser(s) is depicted. Anenvironment is shown where different types of client devices 402A, 402Bmay be used (e.g., in a BYOD context), such that one may be locallyequipped with a suitable CEB, and another client device may not have asuitable local CEB installed. In such an environment, systems describedin FIGS. 4, 5 and 7 can be used to support each of the client devicesbased on the availability of a locally installed and suitable CEB.

FIG. 9 depicts an example process flow for using local embeddedbrowser(s) and hosted secured browser(s). The process flow can be usedin the environment described above in FIG. 8, to determine whether anembedded browser or a hosted secured browser should be used for eachclient device to access a network application. For example, in operation901, a HTTP client can attempt to access a web service (e.g., server ofa network application). In operation 903, the web service can redirectthe HTTP client to a gateway service for authentication. In operation905, the gateway service can determine if the HTTP client is a CEB. Ifso, in operation 909, the gateway service can determine if the CEB is asuitable CEB, e.g., capable of enforcing defined application policies.If so, in operation 911, the CEB is allowed access to the web service,and can enforce the defined policies.

If the gateway service determines that the HTTP client is not a CEB, thegateway service can cause a virtualized version of a CEB to beinitialized and hosted on a remote server (e.g., a network device 432 ofcloud services 408), in operation 907. In some embodiments, such ahosted CEB may already be available on a network device 432, and can beselected for use. For example in operation 911, the CEB is allowedaccess to the web service, and can enforce the defined policies.

If the gateway service determines that the HTTP client is a CEB, butthat the CEB is not a suitable CEB, the gateway service can cause avirtualized version of a CEB to be initialized and hosted on a remoteserver (e.g., a network device 432 of cloud services 408), in operation907. In some embodiments, such a hosted CEB may already be available ona network device 432, and can be selected for use. For example inoperation 911, the CEB is allowed access to the web service, and canenforce the defined policies.

In some embodiments, if the user is requesting access to a webapplication located in a company data center, the gateway service (incloud service or on premise) can allow access when the clientapplication with CEB is detected. Otherwise, the request can be routedto a service with the hosted virtualized version of the CEB, and thenaccess is authenticated and granted.

At operation 905 and/or operation 909 for instance, the decisions madeon whether the HTTP client is a CEB and whether it is a suitable CEB maybe determined by a number of factors. For example, to determine if theHTTP client is CEB, the gateway service may take into account factors,for example including at least one of: user Identity and strength ofauthentication, client Location, client IP Address, how trusted the useridentity, client location, client IP are, jailbreak status of the clientdevice, status of anti-malware software, compliance to corporate policyof the client device, and/or remote attestation or other evidence ofintegrity of the client software.

To determine if the CEB is able to honor or support all definedapplication policies (which may vary by client version, client OSplatform and other factors), the client device's software and gatewayservice may perform capability negotiation and/or exchange versioninformation. In some embodiments, the gateway service can query or checka version number or identifier of the CEB to determine if the CEB is asuitable CEB to use.

Driving all the traffic though the CEB then allows additional control ofcontent accessing SaaS and Web based systems. Data Loss Prevention (DLP)of SaaS and Web traffic can be applied through the CEB app with featuresincluding copy and paste control to other CEB access applications or ITmanaged devices. DLP can also be enforced by enabling content to bedownloaded only to designated file servers or services under IT control.

Referring now to FIG. 10, depicted is an example embodiment of a systemfor managing user access to webpages. Some webpages (or websites) areknown to be safe while others may be suspect. A user may access awebpage via a corresponding URL through a standard browser. For example,the user may click on a link corresponding to the URL, which may beincluded in an email being viewed using a mail application. An accessgateway (SWG) may intercept an access request generated by the clickingof the link, and can determine if the corresponding URL is safe orsuspect. If the URL is known to be safe, the access gateway can allowthe request to proceed to the corresponding website or web server. Ifthe URL is suspect, the access gateway can redirect the request to behandled via a hosted secure browser. The secure browser can requestaccess for, and access the webpage (on behalf of the standard browser),and can allow the webpage information to be conveyed to the standardbrowser, similar to the handling of a network application via browserredirection as discussed in connection with at least FIGS. 7 and 5.

C. Systems and Methods for Offline Usage and Synchronization of NetworkApplications

In many implementations of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications,client devices must be continuously connected to application servers toallow users to interact with the SaaS application, preventing the userfrom being able to work offline, such as when travelling or with poor orintermittent connectivity. Even in implementations in which some or allof the network application may be cached locally to provide offline use,users may be limited to specific portions of the application orfunctions, or may be limited in the data they may access. For example,one such implementation of a network application providing email mayallow for local caching and offline view of some emails, but may notallow editing, composing new emails or replies. In another example, anetwork application providing a spreadsheet or database may similarlyallow read-only viewing of data, but not allow editing. To counteractthis, some implementations provide for synchronization of offlinechanges when the client device is once again connected to theapplication servers. However, much of the data or portions of thenetwork application may be identified as non-cacheable, preventingtypical browser-based caching mechanisms.

Furthermore, caching of data for offline use may represent a significantsecurity vulnerability. While the user may initially provideauthentication credentials and achieve authenticated access to thenetwork application or data, once offline, the user typically hasunimpeded access to the cached data. A malicious actor that obtainsaccess to the client device, either locally or via a network, may beable to access the cached data.

The present invention provides methods for storing, accessing, andsynchronizing data from a SaaS application, enabling SaaS data to beinteracted with, regardless of connectivity, while providing secureauthentication when offline. During a first time period when online, auser may perform an authentication procedure and provide credentials toan application server, which may provide an authentication token foraccess to secure data or applications. In some implementations, theauthentication token may comprise a shared encryption key or othercryptographic key for decrypting provided data. The authentication tokenand user credentials may be cached locally. During a second time periodwhen offline or when experiencing intermittent connectivity, a clientapplication on the client device comprising an embedded browser foraccessing the network application may act as a local authenticationserver: the user may provide authentication credentials to the networkapplication. If the credentials match the previously provided and cachedcredentials, then the client application may retrieve the cachedauthentication token and allow the embedded browser to resume utilizingthe network application and/or data; while if the new credentials do notmatch the previously provided and cached credentials, access may bedenied. To prevent brute-force attacks, the locally cached credentialsand/or token may be expired or deleted after a predetermined timeperiod.

The embedded browser and cached version of the network application maycontinue to operate normally in such implementations. For example, theembedded browser may display a typical log-in window in which the usermay provide credentials, and may attempt to transmit the credentials toan authentication server or application server. While online, the clientapplication may allow the transmission to proceed and/or may forward thetransmission to the application server or authentication server. Whileoffline, the client application may intercept the transmission andperform the comparison to locally cached credentials. Thus, the embeddedbrowser may perform authentication agnostic to whether the device isonline or offline at that time, requiring no changes to the browser ornetwork application.

FIG. 11 illustrates one embodiment of interactions between a clientapplication 1106 and a network application 1102. The client application1106 resides in memory of the client device 1100 and, when executed by aprocessor of the client device, communicates via a communication channel1118 to the network application 1102. The network application 1102 canbe provided for by one or more servers 1104. The communication channel1118 between the client device 1100 and one or more servers 1104 can beany form of internet communication and via any type and form of network.Protocols used may include any network layer protocol such as IPv4,IPv6, etc.; any transport layer protocol such as TCP, UDP, etc.; and/orany type of application layer protocol, such as HTTP, HTTPS, etc.

As a component of the client application 1106, the embedded browser 1108further has the ability to authenticate the client application 1106 viaan authenticator 1110 (sometimes referred to as an authentication client1110), and the ability to synchronize data flowing across thecommunication channel 1118 to the network application 1102 via asynchronizer 1112 (sometimes referred to as a client synchronizer orsynchronization client 1112). Similarly, the network application 1102has the ability to verify user authentication via an authenticator 1114(sometimes referred to as an authentication host, authentication server,or by similar terms), and also synchronize data flowing across thecommunication channel 1118 from the embedded browser 1108 via asynchronizer 1116 (sometimes referred to as a synchronization host,synchronization server, or a similar term).

The embedded browser 1108 can be integrated with the client application1106 to ensure that traffic related to the network application is routedthrough and/or processed in the client application 1106, which canprovide the client application 1106 with real-time visibility to thetraffic (e.g., when decrypted through the client application 1106), anduser interactions and behavior.

FIG. 12 is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a method forproviding authenticated access to an offline application that allows theembedded browser 1108 and network application 1102 to verify that asanctioned user accesses the data. In step 1200, in someimplementations, the user inputs their credentials into the clientapplication 1106 running on the client device 1100. In step 1202, theclient application determines whether the client application 1106 hasconnectivity to the application server. In some implementations, ifconnectivity is intermittent or of low bandwidth, the client applicationmay treat the client as offline. In some implementations, the clientapplication 1106 is online if a functioning and reliable communicationchannel 1118 exists with the application server. The client applicationmay determine whether it has connectivity to the server via measurementof round trip times to the server, latency, loss rates, or any othermeans. In one implementation, the client application 1106 may ping theone or more servers 1104 and wait for a response. A response within apredetermined time out period may indicate that the client application1106 is online and communicating with the one or more servers 1104. Thepinging can be sent according to a timer or by listening, through anymeans, to the hardware components that interface with the physical layerin the TCP/IP model. Activity on the physical layer could indicateinternet connectivity, triggering a ping to be sent to the one or moreservers 1104. In step 1232, if there is not a functioning or reliablecommunication channel 1118 (e.g. the client application 1106 is notonline or treats a poor connection as if not online), the user is notgiven access to the data on the network application 1102. In step 1204,if there is a functioning communication channel 1118, and the clientapplication 1106 is online, the embedded browser 1108 sends thecredentials to the network application 1102.

At step 1206, the network application 1102 evaluates whether thecredentials received match stored credentials in the one or more servers1104 or communicates with an authentication server to determine if thecredentials indicate the user is authorized (e.g. by matching authorizedcredentials in a user database). The user may be registered with thenetwork application 1102 such that the one or more servers 1104 orauthentication server has stored the user's credentials.

For example, the server may compare the string of characters receivedfrom the embedded browser 1108 to the string of characters stored in theone or more servers 1104. If the characters match identically, thedecision can be made that the credentials match. In someimplementations, the credentials may be encrypted or hashed (e.g. toprevent plaintext transmission of a password), and the hash may becompared to a hash of a use password. In step 1208, if the credentialsdo not match the stored credentials, the network application 1102 doesnot provide access to data in the embedded browser 1108. In step 1210,if the credentials do match the stored credentials, the one or moreservers 1104 or an authentication server may transmit an authenticationtoken to the client application 1106, authorizing the client device1100.

In step 1212, the client application 1106 may store the credentials sentto the network application 1102 in the memory of the client device 1100.In some implementations, step 1212 may occur at an earlier point, e.g.after, before, or concurrently with step 1204. In step 1214, the clientapplication 1106 receives the authentication token via the communicationchannel 1118.

In another embodiment, in addition to receiving an authentication token,the client application 1106 receives a token validity time uponverification of the credentials by the one or more servers 1104. A tokenvalidity time or other indicator of successful verification may bereceived in addition to, or in place of, the authentication token. Inaddition to the token validity time being received by the clientapplication 1106, a timer that corresponds with the token validity timemay also be received, or received in place of, the token validity time.

For example, in step 1210, after the determination that the credentialsmatch the credentials in the one or more servers 1104, a token validitytime can be transmitted to the client application 1106. Thus, instead ofrequiring an authentication token to access data in the networkapplication 1102, the token validity time would allow access to data inthe network application 1102 for a certain period of time until thetoken expires. The token validity time may be set to expire after acertain pre-defined period of time, or the network application 1102 maydynamically set an expiration time for the token validity time dependingon the application, sensitivity of data, current application traffic,etc. In one embodiment, the token validity time may be stored in thememory of the client device 1100. If the token validity time isdetermined to be expired by the client application 1106, the clientapplication 1106 may flush the token from the memory of the clientdevice 1100.

In step 1216, the client application 1106 stores the authenticationtoken in memory of the client device 1100 (e.g. in a cache of the clientapplication).

In some embodiments, responsive to determining that the embedded browser1108 was used to make the access request, the network application 1102can perform or provide authentication and single-sign-on (SSO), and canallow the embedded browser 1108 to connect directly to the SaaS webservice. The client application 1106 can establish a secure connectionto the one or more servers 1104 to provide a communication session forthe user to access the network application 1102 using the clientapplication 1106 and the embedded browser 1108.

In step 1218, the receipt of the authentication token, or other methodsof establishing an authenticated connection to the network application1102, allow the embedded browser 1108 to access to the data in the oneor more servers 1104. The data accessed from the one or more servers1104 may be accessible by any user upon authentication credentialverification.

The data accessed on the one or more servers 1104 can be user-specific,indicating that the specific data can only be accessed by that one userand not everyone else who has access to the one or more servers 1104.The user-specific data may be standard data or secured data, which isprotected by any means of encryption. In addition, the user-specificdata may be decrypted at the one or more servers 1104 and thentransmitted to the embedded browser 1108 and encrypted again, or theuser-specific data may be transmitted to the embedded browser 1108 andthen decrypted, or any variation of decrypting/encrypting. Thedecryption may be accomplished by private key methods, for example usingthe authentication token associated with successful authenticationcredential verification, or public key methods, or other means ofdecryption. A description of successful authentication credentialverification can be found in steps 1200-1218.

In one embodiment, temporal and geographic restrictions on documentaccess may be useful. For example, an administrator may deploy adocument access policy that restricts the availability of the documents(stored in the memory of the client device 1100) to a specified timewindow and/or a geographic zone (e.g., as determined by a GPS chip)within which the client device 1100 must reside in order to access thedocuments. Further, the document access policy can instruct the clientapplication 1106 to delete the documents or otherwise make themunavailable when the specified time period expires or if the clientdevice 1106 is taken outside of the defined geographic zone.

The client application 1106 may also receive encrypted traffic from thenetwork application, and can decrypt the traffic before furtherprocessing (e.g., rendering by the embedded browser 1108).

In step 1220, data that has been accessed by the embedded browser 1108is cached by the client application 1106 in the memory of the clientdevice 1100. The memory of the client device 1100 may be partitioned tofurther support securing data by requiring other forms of encryption orauthentication. The method in which data that has been identified asnon-cacheable is cached, will be described in detail below.

Caching can include an application that implements a file system thatstores documents and/or other types of files. The file system cancomprise a portion of a computer-readable memory of the client device1100. The file system can be logically separated from other portions ofthe computer-readable memory of the client device 1100. In this way,enterprise data can be stored in secure memory and private data can bestored in a separate portion of the computer-readable memory of theclient device for instance.

In step 1222, a decision is made regarding whether the clientapplication 1106 is online or not. This process is similar to theprocess in step 1202 as discussed above. As illustrated by the loop backto step 1218, if the client application 1106 is online, the embeddedbrowser 1108 can continue to access data from the network application1102 and store the accessed data in memory of the client device 1100. Ifthe decision is made in step 1222 that the client application 1106 isoffline, then access to the data from the network application 1102 maystop.

In step 1224, even though the client application 1106 is determined tobe offline, the embedded browser 1108 may try to reconnect to thenetwork application 1102 and thus try to re-send the storedauthentication credentials. In other embodiments, for example, after atimer expiration or an idle period, the client application may requirethe user to re-login or provide authentication credentials again (e.g.after waking from sleep, or after an offline usage period of tenminutes, half an hour, one hour, etc.). When offline, the clientapplication 1106 may intercept the attempted transmission of theauthentication credentials because it has determined that the clientdevice 1100 is offline. In an alternate embodiment, an offline passwordmay be implemented for offline authentication.

In step 1226, the client application 1106 evaluates whether theintercepted authentication credentials match the stored credentials inthe memory of the client device 1100, from step 1212, similar to theprocess in step 1206. In another embodiment, if a token validity time isimplemented, the client application 1106 determines whether the timecorresponding to the token validity time has expired. Access to the datamay only be granted if the token validity time has not expired. Thetoken validity time may prevent against such acts as stealing hardwarethat has been authenticated to access the network application 1102. Ifhardware has been stolen with an authentication credential stored in thememory of the device, it may be prudent to require an additional tokenvalidity time to allow access to the network application 1102. Access todata may be granted upon verification of an authentication token, anun-expired token validity time, and/or other methods or combinations ofmethods that verify whether a device is approved to access data.

If the authentication credentials do not match, the client application1106 will not be able to access the cached data, indicated by step 1232.In an alternative embodiment, the client application 1106 may try tore-transmit credentials, causing the embedded browser 1108 tore-intercept the credentials and reevaluate whether the credentialsmatch. In another alternative, the user may be allowed to enter newcredentials into the client application 1106. Any credential can beevaluated at this step, step 1226, as long as the credentials were atone point previously verified by the one or more servers 1104. In step1228, if the intercepted credentials match the credentials stored in theclient device 1100, the client application proceeds to retrieve thestored authentication token, from step 1216, from the memory of theclient device 1100.

In step 1230, the data that was cached in the memory of the clientdevice 1100, from step 1220, is accessed by the embedded browser 1108using the retrieved authentication token. In another embodiment, thecached data may be encrypted and require the authentication token, orother forms of decryption, before it is subsequently accessed by theclient application 1106 again. In this manner, the client application1106, even though offline, can still access and interact with data fromthe network application 1102.

FIG. 13 is a flow chart illustrating a method for synchronizing anoffline and online version of data, where the data is obtained from aSaaS application. In step 1300, data is sent in a first state to anembedded browser 1108 of a client application 1106 from one or moreservers 1104. The data that was sent to the embedded browser 1108 in thefirst state could be requested by the embedded browser. This data can bedescribed as a first item of data. This first item of data can be userspecific, as described under step 1218.

Additionally, in some implementations, data can be sent to the embeddedbrowser 1108 that was not requested by the embedded browser 1108.Accompanying the first item of data sent to the embedded browser 1108,whether it was requested or not, may be a second item of data sent tothe embedded browser 1108. Similar to the first item of data, the seconditem of data can be user specific, as described under step 1218.

Examples of first and second items of data could be portions of webpages, complete web pages, portions of documents, complete documents,portions of files, complete files, etc. The second item of data can beselected because it was specifically requested from the embedded browser1108 via user intervention through the client application 1106, or thesecond item of data can be selected without user intervention.

An example of selecting the second item of data without userintervention could be selecting the second item of data because of alink from the first item of data. In other words, the first item of data(e.g. web page, report, spreadsheet, or any other such data) can becrawled and second items of data can be extracted from following thehyperlinks or other links associated with the first item of data (e.g.further web pages, live data for the report or spreadsheet, etc.). Thenumber of linked-to second items of data can be iteratively determinedby the client application 1106. Examples of how the client application1106 can determine the number of linked-to second items of data includeusing a history of requests for data from the network application 1102,and/or further processing the historic requests. In other words, thehistory of requested data can help indicate how many linked-to seconditems should be selected. In addition, the history of requests can befurther processed by a neural network making a determination, orpredicting, the data to be selected. In predicting relevant data to beselected, the neural network can balance such requirements as availablememory in the client device 1100, available memory allocated for theparticular client application 1106, time required to crawl selectedpages, and the like. A neural network or other methods of statisticalanalysis can also be used to determine relevant first items of data.

In another implementation, the second item of data may be selectedwithout user intervention from data that has been previously requested.In other words, historic access data can be used in determining whetherdata should be selected to accompany a first item of data. In anotherimplementation, the second item of data may be selected without user byusing the history of requested data to identify data that will likely beaccessed while offline. In addition, both the first and second items ofdata can be flagged by third parties to indicate that the data should beselected, and therefore sent, to the embedded browser 1108.

Regardless of how much data was sent and whether the embedded browser1108 requested the data or not, the combination of first item and seconditem data, or first item of data alone, sent from the one or moreservers 1104 to the embedded browser 1108, may be referred to as datasent in a first state. The embedded browser 1108 may receive the data inthis first state from the one or more servers 1104. The received data inthis first state may be user-specific, as described in step 1218.Additionally, the received data may only be accessed by the embeddedbrowser 1108 upon a successful authentication credential verification,which can be found in steps 1200-1218.

In step 1302, the client application 1106 caches the received firststate data from the one or more servers 1104. This data can be cachedand is substantive because of the items of data that have beenextracted.

In step 1304, the decision is made regarding whether the clientapplication 1106 is online or not. This processes is similar to theprocess in step 1202 discussed above. As shown in step 1306, theembedded browser 1108 can interact with the data on the one or moreservers 1104 as long as the client application 1106 is online. Part ofthe desirability of SaaS applications is the ability to manipulate datathat is not located on the client device 1100. As long as the clientapplication 1106 and network application 1102 can communicate, theinvention proceeds similarly to other implementations not specified inthe present invention.

There may become a point however where the client application 1106 isnot communicating with the network application 1102. Also shown in step1304, the client application 1106 can determine whether there is acommunication loss. In step 1308 the embedded browser 1108 may attemptto modify the data from the one or more servers 1104, not recognizingthe loss of communication. Alternatively, the embedded browser 1108 mayrecognize the loss of communication, but proceed to modify the data thathas been cached in step 1302. The modification of the data is whattransitions the data from a first state to a second state.

In step 1310, the client application 1106 may intercept the userinteractions from the embedded browser 1108. Although the data at theone or more servers 1104 is still in a first state, the embedded browser1108 is modifying the cached data, creating data in a second state. Auser interaction is some sort of interaction performed by the user.Examples of user interactions that can be intercepted are: interrupts(e.g., moving the mouse to a different portion of a web page ordocument, clicking on something on a web page, etc.) and editing data(e.g., editing a word document, annotating documents with digitalnotes/highlighting capabilities) or the like. In an alternateembodiment, the user may not interact with the data at all and simplyview the data.

In step 1312, the client application 1106 stores, logs, or records, eachintercepted user interaction in the memory of the client device 1100.The interactions can be stored in the same memory that the cached datais stored in, from step 1302, or the interactions can be stored indifferent memory. If an authentication token was received and stored aspart of the data that was received in the first state, from step 1300,the authentication token can be used again as credential verificationwhen storing the intercepted user interactions.

The interactions can be stored sequentially, so that when the userinteractions are read, the order of the user interactions is executed inthe same sequence as the user made the interactions. In an alternateembodiment, the order of the user interactions does not matter and theuser interactions can be stored in any sequence. The user interactionscan be stored individually, maintaining their sequence if desired, oraggregated and stored such that the sequence is maintained if desired.The stored user interactions are buffered until the client application1106 determines that the client application 1106 is online and connectedto the network application 1102 again.

In step 1314, the decision is made regarding whether the clientapplication 1106 is online or not and communicating with the one or moreservers 1104, as discussed above in connection with step 1202. If theclient application 1106 determines that there is no communication withthe one or more servers 1104, the client application 1106 may continueto allow the embedded browser 1108 to modify the cached data from step1302, indicated by the loop back to step 1308. In step 1316 the clientapplication determines that there is communication with the one or moreservers 1104 and sends the buffered user interactions to the one or moreservers 1104.

In step 1318, the one or more servers 1104 receives the aggregatedsequence of user interactions from the embedded browser 1108. In someembodiments, the one or more servers 1104 may receive the data that theembedded browser 1108 modified to be in a second state, as well as thesequence of user interactions.

In step 1320, the data on the one or more servers 1104, which is stillin a first state, is modified by the one or more servers 1104. Executingthe sequence of received user interactions causes the data to change toa second state. The user interactions can be executed without the clientdevice 1100 knowing that the data on the one or more servers 1104 isbeing modified. For example, the network application 1102 can performthe user interactions and not communicate to the embedded browser 1108that the one or more servers 1104 are modifying data. Alternatively, theuser interactions may be performed by the one or more servers 1104 insuch a way that the client device 1100 detects what is going on, but isunable to display the changes to the data. For example, the recordedsequences can be performed by the one or more servers 1104 faster thanreal time and/or without providing visual output to the embedded browser1108.

In an alternate embodiment, the execution of the user interactions maybe performed in such a way that would allow the client device 1100 todisplay to the user what interactions are being executed. For example,while offline, the user of the client device 1100 may make severalchanges to the data such as editing a sentence and moving the mouse downthe page. When the client device 1100 reconnects to the internet orreestablishes reliable communications with the application server, theuser is notified of the reconnection and the page that the user wasworking on reverts to an older page. As the user watches the screen ofthe client device 1100, changes are made to the older page, such asediting the sentence and moving the mouse down the page. Upon thecompletion of the changes, or when the data on the one or more servers1104 has been successfully updated from a first state to a second state,the user knows or can be notified that he/she is working on live dataagain and all of the changes the user makes to the data by the clientapplication 1106 will be executed immediately on the one or more servers1104.

After executing the sequence of user interactions, in an alternateembodiment, the network application 1102 may perform a check to ensurethat the data in the second state, that was modified by the embeddedbrowser 1108, matches the data in the second state at the one or moreservers 1104. One example of a check that could be performed could be acomparison of the strings of the data received in the second state tothe strings of data in the one or more servers 1104 after executing theuser interactions, which would verify that the data is identical.

In step 1322, the one or more servers 1104 sends the data in the secondstate back to the client application 1106, through the embedded browser1108, so the data in the second state can be cached, as indicated instep 1302. The cycle repeats until the user is finished modifying data.Thus, modifying data from a SaaS application is not dependent on areliable connection.

Accordingly, the systems and methods discussed herein provide forstoring, accessing, and synchronizing data from a SaaS application,enabling SaaS data to be interacted with, regardless of connectivity,while providing secure authentication when offline.

It should be understood that the systems described above may providemultiple ones of any or each of those components and these componentsmay be provided on either a standalone machine or, in some embodiments,on multiple machines in a distributed system. The systems and methodsdescribed above may be implemented as a method, apparatus or article ofmanufacture using programming and/or engineering techniques to producesoftware, firmware, hardware, or any combination thereof. In addition,the systems and methods described above may be provided as one or morecomputer-readable programs embodied on or in one or more articles ofmanufacture. The term “article of manufacture” as used herein isintended to encompass code or logic accessible from and embedded in oneor more computer-readable devices, firmware, programmable logic, memorydevices (e.g., EEPROMs, ROMs, PROMs, RAMs, SRAMs, etc.), hardware (e.g.,integrated circuit chip, Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA),Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), etc.), electronicdevices, a computer readable non-volatile storage unit (e.g., CD-ROM,USB Flash memory, hard disk drive, etc.). The article of manufacture maybe accessible from a file server providing access to thecomputer-readable programs via a network transmission line, wirelesstransmission media, signals propagating through space, radio waves,infrared signals, etc. The article of manufacture may be a flash memorycard or a magnetic tape. The article of manufacture includes hardwarelogic as well as software or programmable code embedded in a computerreadable medium that is executed by a processor. In general, thecomputer-readable programs may be implemented in any programminglanguage, such as LISP, PERL, C, C++, C#, PROLOG, or in any byte codelanguage such as JAVA. The software programs may be stored on or in oneor more articles of manufacture as object code.

While various embodiments of the methods and systems have beendescribed, these embodiments are illustrative and in no way limit thescope of the described methods or systems. Those having skill in therelevant art can effect changes to form and details of the describedmethods and systems without departing from the broadest scope of thedescribed methods and systems. Thus, the scope of the methods andsystems described herein should not be limited by any of theillustrative embodiments and should be defined in accordance with theaccompanying claims and their equivalents.

We claim:
 1. A method comprising: transmitting, by a client applicationof a client device, authentication credentials of a user to anapplication hosted by one or more remote computing devices; receiving,by the client application from the application, an authentication tokenresponsive to authorization of the client device by the applicationusing the authentication credentials; storing, by the clientapplication, the authentication credentials and authentication token ina memory of the client device; accessing, by the client application,data of the application using the authentication token, the data of theapplication stored in the memory of the client device; intercepting, bythe client application, responsive to a determination that the clientdevice is not in communication with the application, a transmission ofsecond authentication credentials to the application; determining, bythe client application, that the second authentication credentialscorrespond to the authentication credentials stored in the memory of theclient device; retrieving, from the memory of the client device, by theclient application, the authentication token; and accessing, by theclient application using the authentication token, the data of theapplication stored in the memory of the client device.
 2. The method ofclaim 1, further comprising determining, by the client application, thata time of validity of the authentication token stored in the memory ofthe client device has not expired.
 3. The method of claim 2, furthercomprising receiving the time of validity for the authentication tokenfrom the application, and initiating a timer corresponding to the timeof validity.
 4. The method of claim 2, further comprising determining,by the client application, that the time of validity for theauthentication token stored in the memory of the client device hasexpired and removing the authentication token from the memory of theclient device.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein accessing the data ofthe application stored in the memory of the client device furthercomprises decrypting the data, using the authentication token, by theclient application.
 6. The method of claim 1, further comprisingaccessing, by an embedded browser of the client application, data of theapplication associated with a user.
 7. The method of claim 6, furthercomprising decrypting, by the client application, the data associatedwith the user via the authentication token.
 8. A system comprising: aclient application of a client device configured to: transmitauthentication credentials of a user to an application hosted by one ormore remote computing devices; receive, from the application, anauthentication token responsive to authorization of the client device bythe application using the authentication credentials; store theauthentication credentials and authentication token in a memory of theclient device; access data of the application using the authenticationtoken, the data of the application stored in the memory of the clientdevice; intercept, responsive to a determination that the client deviceis not in communication with the application, a transmission of secondauthentication credentials to the application; determine that the secondauthentication credentials correspond to the authentication credentialsstored in the memory of the client device; retrieve from the memory ofthe client device the authentication token, and access, using theauthentication token, the data of the application stored in the memoryof the client device.
 9. The system of claim 8, wherein the clientapplication is further configured to determine that a time of validityof the authentication token stored in the memory of the client devicehas not expired.
 10. The system of claim 9, wherein the clientapplication is further configured to receive the time of validity forthe authentication token from the application and to initiate a timercorresponding to the time of validity.
 11. The system of claim 9,wherein the client application is further configured to determine thatthe time of validity for the authentication token stored in the memoryof the client device has expired and removing the authentication tokenfrom the memory of the client device.
 12. The system of claim 8, whereinthe client application is further configured to decrypt the data of theapplication using the authentication token.
 13. The system of claim 8,wherein an embedded browser of the client application is furtherconfigured to access data of the application associated with a user. 14.The system of claim 13, wherein the client application is furtherconfigured to decrypt the data associated with the user via theauthentication token.
 15. A non-transitory computer-readable mediumstoring instructions that, when executed by one or more processors,cause the one or more processors to: transmit authentication credentialsof a user to an application hosted by one or more remote computingdevices; receive, from the application, an authentication tokenresponsive to authorization by the application using the authenticationcredentials; store the authentication credentials and authenticationtoken in a memory; access data of the application using theauthentication token, the data of the application stored in the memory;intercept, responsive to a determination that the client application isnot in communication with the application, a transmission of secondauthentication credentials to the application; determine that the secondauthentication credentials correspond to the authentication credentialsstored in the memory; retrieve, from the memory of the client device theauthentication token, and access, using the authentication token, thedata of the application stored in the memory of the client device. 16.The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15, furthercomprising instructions configured to cause the one or more processorsto determine that a time of validity of the authentication token storedin the memory has not expired.
 17. The non-transitory computer-readablemedium of claim 15, further comprising instructions configured to causethe one or more processors to receive the time of validity for theauthentication token from the application and to initiate a timercorresponding to the time of validity.
 18. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 15, further comprising instructionsconfigured to cause the one or more processors to determine that thetime of validity for the authentication token stored in the memory hasexpired and removing the authentication token from the memory.
 19. Thenon-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15, further comprisinginstructions configured to cause the one or more processors to accessusing an embedded browser of the client application data of theapplication associated with a user.
 20. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 19, further comprising instructionsconfigured to cause the one or more processors to decrypt the dataassociated with the user via the authentication token.